Chocolate Fondant

Chocolate fondants have stopped many a reality tv wannabe-chef in their tracks. The recipe is not difficult or complicated, it’s all to do with the baking. Not long enough and they collapse, too long and the centre is no longer liquid. On the plus side you can make them in advance, keep them in the fridge or freezer and bake them exactly when you need them: they need to be served immediately.

I originally only planned to put them in dariole moulds but had far too much mixture for my six moulds and put the rest in ramekin dishes. If you are worried about turning them out to serve them then ramekin dishes are the answer. They still taste just as good! They still need to be served immediately: they will keep on baking as the dish is hot and then as they cool down they will collapse.

If you want to turn them out, try dariole moulds:

Chocolate fondant turned out

As long as the moulds are properly prepared the fondants will turn out easily, even though they look like they will collapse at the slightest touch. And they are delicious inside!

Not the prettiest dessert to photograph!

I could probably have baked mine for a minute less to get an even more liquid centre, or even just turned it out more quickly. Once you have made the mixture and put it in your dishes or moulds they can be baked immediately or stored in the fridge or freezer. They can then be baked straight from the fridge or freezer: you just need to add two minutes to the baking time from chilled, or four from frozen.

Just make sure you don’t over fill the moulds as I did when I baked the first four and although they tasted great they didn’t look too impressive! One erupted like a volcano in the oven and I think they were a little overdone:

Overfilled fondants!

Which is why I took some of the mixture out of the remaining moulds before putting them in the freezer! This recipe quantity should make 4-6 fondants, depending on the size of your dishes or moulds and comes from a great article I read about fondants.

Recipe

Ingredients

Butter to grease the moulds

2 tablespoons cocoa powder

120g butter, cut into pieces

120g dark chocolate, broken into pieces

2 eggs plus 2 egg yolks

120g caster sugar

2 tablepsoons plain flour

Method

Set the oven to 200ºC if baking immediately.

Grease the moulds with butter and then dust with the cocoa powder:

Butter and dust the moulds

Put the butter and chocolate into a heatproof bowl and melt over a pan of simmering water. Allow to cool a little.

Whisk the eggs, egg yolk and sugar until light and fluffy.

Ready to mix the chocolate into the whisked egg and sugar mixture

Pour the chocolate mixture into the whisked eggs and sugar and fold in. Then fold in the flour.

Pour into the moulds so that they are about two thirds full.

Do not fill this full!

At this point the fondants can be kept in the fridge or freezer until you are ready to bake them.

Bake for 12 minutes or 14 minutes from chilled, 16 minutes from frozen. When they are baked the tops should be set and they only need about 30 seconds to rest before turning out.

If you have tried chocolate fondants before I’d love to hear about it – any advice is welcome!

Categories: Baking, Cakes, Chocolate, Desserts, Recipes

Tags: baking, cake, chocolate, chocolate fondants, dessert, recipe