Chocolate Candies

For today’s post I chose a traditional Brazilian recipe: Brigadeiros or Brazilian chocolate candies.

History says the chocolate candies originated in the South of Brazil, Rio Grande do Sul, circa 1920 when some old ladies that couldn’t find enough supply of fresh milk decided to mix condensed milk instead with chocolate to prepare a dessert. However the candies became nationally known when in 1940 the Brigadier Eduardo Gomes decided to use them as give-away gifts for people attending the parties he promoted during his rum for presidential elections. So after this, the candies were name “Brigadeiros” (Brigadiers).

These candies are a must-have in all kid’s birthday parties and I don’t know one child that doesn’t like them. What I do know is that a lot of adults also like them very much and I’m sure you will too once you try them.

To makethis recipe you need:

1 can of condensed milk

2 tablespoons of sweetened cocoa powder

1 tablespoon of unsweetened cocoa powder (optional)

1 tablespoon of butter

Chocolate sprinkles or colored sugar strands

Small paper cases

To prepare the candies:

Add all the ingredients to a heavy bottom saucepan. Mix them well and bring to the stove top to cook in low heat stirring constantly. The cooking time is about 15 min. The tip I can give you is it is ready when starts to boil and the dough doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pan anymore.  

Transfer the mixture to a butter plate and let it cool down completely.

When the mixture is cooled it is time to start rolling the candies in small balls. Put the chocolate sprinkles in a soup bowl or some deep dish. Open the paper cases and put them side by side.

Butter your hands and put a teaspoon of dough on them and roll into a ball. Dip the ball in the sprinkles and roll it until it is completely covered. Transfer the candy to a small paper case. At first seems a bit complicated but in fact it is very easy. Once you’ve done a few of them it is going to be easier.

This recipe yields around 20 candies depending on the size you choose for them (Mine are about 2cm each).

Christmas Cookies

The Christmas spirit is finally in the air in our home. We managed to put our small Christmas tree up, spread some cute decorations around the living room and start the race of Christmas shopping.

To embrace the Christmas spirit even more I spent my Saturday morning baking little cute cookies with a recipe that I adapted from one my mum used to bake when I was a child. This is not the traditional Christmas sugar cookies recipe but if you trust me you will find out they taste very nice. And with some decoration they can be easily called Christmas cookies.

My Christmas Cookies Recipe

150g of unsalted butter (cut in small pieces)

700g of flour

2 eggs

1 1/2 cup of sugar

1 teaspoon of baking powder

250g of mascarpone cheese

Start mixing 500g of flour, the butter and the eggs in a bowl with a hand mixer. This mixture gets really dry and crumbly.

In a separate bow, still using the hand mixer in lower speed, mix the mascarpone cheese, sugar and the baking powder.

Combine both mixtures in one bowl and use the hand mixer for more 2 or 3 minutes until totally incorporated. Cover the bowl with cling film and bring the dough to the fridge to rest for 30 minutes.

Transfer the dough to a flat floured surface. At this point it should be just a bit sticky and from now on you need to work the dough and add the rest of the flour (200g) bit by bit until you it becomes light and smooth.

Divide the dough in 3 equal parts and open each part with a rolling pin until it is about 1/2 a centimetre thick. Using cookie cutters cut your preferred shapes. Place the cut cookies in a flat baking sheet lined with parchment paper and bring to the oven to bake.

The baking time will vary depending of each oven. What you are looking for is a cookie that is firm at the borders, a bit soft in the middle and not too brown. Each of my batches cooked in 8 minutes in 150 degrees Celsius.

After the cookies were ready we had fun decorating them with melted chocolate and colored sugar sprinkles. We used 200g of melted white chocolate and 200g of melted dark chocolate plus a lot of sprinkles. To melt the chocolate just cut each chocolate bar in small pieces and bring to the microwave in medium temperature for 3 minutes.

We finished up wrapping the cookies in small gift bags for little Christmas treats to friends.

Vanilla & Chocolate Cream

I remember when I was a child my mum was always around the kitchen preparing at least three healthy meals for us. Somehow she found the energy to run a house, without any help, take care of four very active kids and cook! I also remember we often had homemade bread, homemade butter (!), yummy cakes and desserts.

One of the desserts that remind me a lot of my childhood is Vanilla and Chocolate cream. It is a very simple recipe that tastes delicious. I had cooked it for our family in Hong Kong a couple of times already following strictly my mum’s recipe. This time, however I decided to adapt the recipe and add chopped dark and milk chocolate. The result was a perfect combination of flavours.

I started chopping the two types of chocolate. Next was the vanilla cream. In a sauce pan I mixed milk, condensed milk, corn starch, butter, egg yolks and vanilla extract. Brought the pan to the stove and stirred constantly until boiling.

For the chocolate cream I mixed milk, cocoa powder, corn starch and sugar in another saucepan and again brought to the stove and mixed until boiling.

I served the dessert in 6 small cups alternating layers of vanilla cream, chopped chocolate and chocolate cream. At the top, a tablespoon of meringue.

Chocolate and Vanilla Cream Dessert Recipe

100g milk chocolate chopped

100g dark chocolate chopped

Vanilla Cream

1 cup of milk

1 can of condensed milk

1 ½ tablespoons corn starch

1 tablespoon of butter

2 egg yolks

½ teaspoon of vanilla extract

Chocolate Cream

500ml of milk

1 ½ tablespoons corn starch

2 tablespoons of sugar

3 tablespoons of unsweetened cocoa powder

Meringue

2 egg whites

4 tablespoons of caster sugar