Eggless chocolate pudding pie

This post has been languishing since Christmas 2016, and I think it's time it saw the light of day. 

For Christmas lunch, I made roast chicken for Pete (and Pete alone, as the sole non-vegetarian). The rest of the menu consisted of a large tray of roasted vegetables with lots of roasted garlic, cauliflower cheese, pulao, dal, rmint and cauliflower parathas, rasam, yogurt rice and plain rice. And boondi raita. 

There were three desserts - gulab jamun cheesecake brought by a friend, cranberry and orange pies made by my sister (spectacular with cream) and this pudding pie that I made. With two non-ovo people in the family (my mother doesn't eat eggs, and my older niece is allergic to eggs so ditto), I wanted to make a dessert that everyone could eat. It had to be chocolate flavoured on request from my sister-in-law because she is a chocolate fiend and will eat practically anything if it has chocolate in it. As an added bonus, my niece is almost as crazy about chocolate. The icing on the cake (in a matter of speaking, that is) was that my niece's best friend ... but you know what I was going to say, right? 

So chocolate pudding it was, a non-baked version made with cornflour. To be absolutely honest, I didn't care for it much - I can take or leave chocolate, and I don't really like moussey desserts. It's the texture of mousse that puts me off, mostly. 

Anyway, everybody who mattered liked it, and that's all I wanted. Be warned though, this pudding pie doesn't keep well, even refrigerated. 

(As for me, I had no room for dessert, but I did have cranberry-orange pie for breakfast the next morning.)

Recipe for: Chocolate pudding pie

Ingredients:

1 9-inch pie crust, readymade or prepared at home
3 cups whole milk (almond milk if you want it to be vegan)
1/4 cup cornflour
1/3 cup sugar
3 tbsp cocoa powder
3 tbsp chocolate chips (semi-sweet if you have it)
1 tsp vanilla extract
pinch of sea salt

Method:

1. Whisk together the cornflour and one cup of the milk to a smooth mixture in a medium saucepan. Then add the remaining milk and cocoa powder, the sugar and the salt. (Note: The cocoa powder will not combine with the milk until you start to whisk the mixture over heat.)

2. Bring the mixture to a boil over medium heat, whisking occasionally. Once it comes to a boil, lower the heat and keep it to a slow rolling boil, whisking constantly until it thickens, about 5 minutes or so.

3. Take the pan off the heat and add the chocolate chips and vanilla, stirring until the chips have dissolved. Pour the filling into the pie shell and let it cool for about 3 minutes, then place a sheet of non-stick paper over the top to form a skin from forming. After 10 minutes, put the pie in the refrigerator and leave it there for a minimum of 3 hours.

Wheat-spelt milk bread

Man, I have to say I'm beginning to find it really difficult to come up with something to say for every post. Usually when I stop thinking too hard about what to write, I tend to unblock the stoppage, as it were... but this is beginning to work less and less often.

I've actually thought about not writing anything at all, just posting the recipe and a couple of photos, but I don't know how well that would work.

I mean, when I go to a food blog and find nothing there but the recipe, I get annoyed, even if the recipe is fantastic. I need at least one photo. If there is a photo or two, or even many photos, but no write-up to go with the recipe, that makes me feel annoyed too.

So you'd imagine that when there is a recipe, a photo or two (or even many photos) and a write-up to boot, I'd be a happy camper? Reasonable assumption, right?

Nope.

You see, I'm unreasonable in my wants. I'm not content with just a recipe, a photo or two (or even many photos), and a write-up. No, I want that write-up to be funny and warm and honest and interesting and readable and at the very least I want the recipe to be fabulous - in other words, pretty much like any post you'd care to choose from the lovely Nupur's wonderful blog One Hot Stove.

Unfortunately it is not given to many of us to successfully combine humour and warmth and honesty and readability and foster a loyal readership of our blog... so we just have to struggle on. And if for some people it's a struggle to write a decent post, it's a struggle for others to read a dull one - even if they know how hard it is to actually write a post, never mind pleasing anyone with it!

And on that philosophical note, I guess I will say a few words about this recipe before I close. You will know some of the words, like "variation of Dan Lepard recipe", "The Guardian newspaper", "minimal kneading" and "tasty", so I'll just say the ones that you may NOT know, which is "tighter crumb because I added spelt flour".

Recipe for: Wheat-spelt milk bread



Ingredients:

2-1/4 cups strong white bread flour
1/4 cup very strong wholewheat bread flour
1/2 cup wholemeal spelt flour
100 ml warm water
200 ml warm whole milk
1 tsp quick-rise yeast
1-1/4 tsp salt
Oil for kneading
Flour for sprinkling
Butter for greasing 7" x 5" loaf pan

Method:

1. Mix together the flours in a big bowl and whisk in the salt and yeast. Then make a hole in the centre and pour in the yeast and warm milk-water mixture. Mix together with a wooden spoon until the dough comes together in a rough ball. Cover the bowl and let the dough rest for 10 minutes.

3. Lightly oil your work area/kneading board and scrape the dough onto it. It will be quite sticky. Knead lightly for 10 seconds. Then put the dough back in the bowl, cover it and let rest for 10 minutes. Repeat this cycle twice more, oiling the work area lightly each time, if required.

4. After the fourth 10-second knead, the dough should be elastic and not very sticky. This time, let the dough rise in the covered bowl for 40 minutes to an hour, or till doubled.

5. Now punch the dough down gently. Lightly flour the work area and pat the dough into an oblong, then roll it up and place it in your buttered 7" x 5" loaf pan. Flour the top of the dough, cover with a clean tea towel and let the dough rise in a warm draught-free area for 45 minutes to an hour - it should be at least 1" over the rim of the loaf pan.

6, Preheat the oven to 200C/450F and place a dish of boiling water on the floor of the oven. Bake for 30-40 minutes, or till the loaf is golden brown on top and sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom. Let cool before slicing.