Chocolate Panna Cotta

Today is going to be a really exciting day for Anushka. She has a school picnic and will be taking the Bart to a park with all her classmates. I know she is going to be so happy and excited, she just loves the 'choo choo train'. With all this excitement I couldn't sleep and was up so early, its just 7.00 and I'm done with all my work. A good one hour before Anushka wakes up and just enough time to finish this post.

I borrowed this amazing all chocolate book from the library last week and have been drooling at the pictures and reading about chocolate every free minute. Yesterday I got super tempted and got all the ingredients ready for a chocolate mousse. But over whipped cream happened and I had to drop the plan. Then I remembered this recipe that I had bookmarked a couple of days before that called for just the amount of cream I had left.

The panna cotta is super chocolaty and makes an amazing quick dessert. I did follow the recipe exactly as given, and what I loved about it is that it uses whole milk instead of cream or half and half and all the sweetness is from the chocolate, there is no extra sugar being added. The recipe is from here.

Chocolate Panna Cotta

Ingredients:

3/4 cups whole milk

1 vanilla bean, slit lengthwise and seeds scraped

1/2 tsp salt (I added only a pinch)

2 tsps powdered unflavored gelatin (I used 1 1/2 tsps)

2 tbs water for the gelatin

4.5 oz dark chocolate (I used semi-sweet)

2.5 tbs cream

Method:

Take the water in a small bowl and sprinkle gelatin evenly over it. Let stand for about 5 mins until softened.

Heat the milk, vanilla bean and seeds, softened gelatin and salt over medium heat and bring to a simmer. Remove from heat.

Remove the vanilla bean and save for another use.

Melt the chocolate over a double boiler making sure no water or steam mixes with the chocolate. Pour the hot milk over the chocolate and carefully emulsify with a hand blender (I added the milk in three batches and just mixed it really well with a spatula and then strained the mixture). Add the cream and stir just to  incorporate. 

Let cool to room temperature and pour into 4 small serving glasses and refrigerate for atleast 4 hours.