Languor

by Gustav

“ A hot-water bottle in my bed at once, and for dinner a cup of thick chocolate beaten up with the yolk of an egg, some toast, and a bunch of grapes…Hurry, dear, I’m freezing. I caught cold in that junk shop at Neuilly…”                                           Colette, Cheri

The blonde gamine at the coffee shop this chilly morning is deliberately observing her hot chocolate. The apparently indulgent barrista has lavished the mug of chocolate with an outsize cumulus of whipped cream as well as a profusion of chocolate curls. The little one is rapt with anticipation but is apparently forestalling her first spoonful of the cool, deflating cream, the crisp chocolate curls, the warm brown liquid underneath. She is wearing her little blue coat, very smart, and is ignoring the swirling, hurried, overheated world around her- and her mother, too, who is reading the paper and sipping her tea.  She savors this moment fully, assessing the visual and aromatic before diving into the gustatory-- the world is one giant mug of delicious possibility.  She catches me watching her, I smile and wink, and she smiles back quickly and raises her spoon.  My rather shabby, midwinter morning has been lightened, and I hope to myself that the girl in the blue coat will somehow hold onto this little cocoa rapture forever.

Long time cohort and chocoholic Claire and I are watching Italian movies and drinking my erstwhile version of hot chocolate on a frigid February afternoon.  The icicles have become columns of ice (this was when we had cold winters) and the little bit of visible skyline is a pale frozen monochromatic gray, but inside the TV. screen is aglow with Bertolucci’s ochres and reds, the toast has been spread with good French butter and retoasted until it sizzled, and the cocoa is steaming hot and super rich with vanilla, brown sugar, and a big square of melting bitter Callebaut at the bottom of the mug. Claire and I have shared many similar movie days over the years, and I had been tweaking my cocoa technique, to her brittle delight.  “ Goos, this cocoa is SOOO good…. but SOOO DEC-a-dent.”  I allow as how that means a lot coming from someone who has a new little green Alfa Romeo, for the summer only, and whom I have observed on occasion eating a whole half pound of Manon filled bon bons during the first half of  “The Last Emperor”. And not sharing. That’s Claire, somehow a catalyst in my quest for the perfect cup of chocolate, which, like her, is at once comforting and deliciously provocative.  HC can be ridiculously extravagant or the essence of watery frugality. Hypnotic or energizing, exotic or down-home, decadent or innocent, well made HC requires attention and time. Like certain friends, I venture. And as with the best of friends, effort and time should be expended, nuances observed and appreciated, and peculiarities cultivated or eschewed. 

Other friends, who get to Europe often, indulge me with all sorts of culinary treasures, and chocolate is way up on there on my list of  “What can I bring you?” responses.  This is a win-win situation, as I am always looking to tweak my HC recipe, or my little chocolate sablēs, and I hate to travel.  Chocolate bars from Italy and Spain this winter have been exceptional (one of them 98 percent cacao!), and my HC recipe has evolved with these new arrivals.  We always carry three of the best chocolates in the world, however, right here at HWFC. Those are El Rey from Venezuela, Valrhona from France, and Scharffen Berger from San Francisco.  We also offer the good old reliable Callebaut, and Cacao Barry cocoa powder.  All of these chocolates have the complexity, intensity and texture that we look for in chocolate nowadays.  They rely on superior Criollo beans that are dried, fermented and roasted expertly, so their various qualities are not diminished, and they are all dark chocolates with high percentages of cacao, not undermined with superfluous sugar or additives. They use real vanilla to kick up their flavor a bit. Good quality chocolate is a robust food that contains an exceptional spectrum of flavor elements—it is at once acidic, astringent, bitter, and sweet from a bit of added sugar. (Cheaper varieties use inferior beans and disguise them with too much sugar or milk products).   The only flavor quality missing, therefore, is saltiness. (Seldom do you see a chocolate-oriented recipe that doesn’t call for at least a pinch of salt.)   The fermenting and roasting processes, if well executed, heighten cacao’s nutty, winy, flowery, earthy, spicy, or caramelly undertones, while preserving its bitterness, astringency and slight acidity.  You hear those terms applied to chocolate (as with wines and coffee) in culinary circles, and I know a couple of choco-obsessive folks who have semi-annual chocolate tastings.  Their attendees murmur devoutly of cacao content percentages, flavor profiles, unctuous mouth feel, and butterscotch undertones…

In my quest for the perfect HC, I’ve tried myriad approaches, and learned a few things worth imparting.  To wit:

 Try simply melting a good quality bar of chocolate in milk, water, or a combination thereof. I like a 70 percent bar melted in half water, half milk. If you want to try soymilk, use unsweetened- you can control the amount of sweetness, the same way you use unsalted butter for baking.  Remember to rinse your saucepan with cold water and leave it a little wet—your milk will never stick or burn.   Proportions will vary with your personal taste. The only rule is to take your time and enjoy the process as much as the resulting quaff.   Chop the chocolate so it melts evenly, add it to your warmed liquids in a heavy saucepan, and whisk lazily til the chocolate is melted and the liquid darkens.  I have used several different whisks, an aerolatte, and even a molinillo, the clever Mexican wooden device created just for this endeavor.  All are fun, but see what you prefer- I always go back to a good old sturdy wire whip. 

Warm your infusion over moderate heat until the first bubble comes to the surface and pops.  Pierre Hermē, in his wonderfully erudite volume Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermē, then whips the mixture til frothy with an immersion blender or in a regular blender.  I like the frothiness this step provides, and it can be achieved with your whip if you are diligent.

I add a little cocoa to the mix- it provides another layer of texture and nuance.  I used to only make hot cocoa, as opposed to chocolate, but lately prefer the mouth feel and delicate flavors that the cocoa butter in the chocolate provides. You get both soprano and bass notes when you use a chocolate bar, if you will. One notable exception is the Laurie Goodhart method that I have shared with you previously, where you steep a cup of best quality natural cocoa powder in a couple of quarts of spring water over a low flame for about three hours, then let it rest overnight. Next morning, you enrich a little bit of this very concentrated, ebon solution with milk or cream and heat it gently. You are happily rewarded for your patience.

         Letting the chocolate bar mixture rest overnight, or at least a couple of hours, improves its texture as well, and you might try making a double batch and comparing the two. Somehow the texture is more silken in the rested version (like when you let your crepe batter repose overnight). If you use cocoa, please consider the natural as opposed to the dutch process.  When they started adding alkali to cocoa back in 1828, they were probably dealing with a pretty grainy, poorly fermented commodity, so the alkali (potassium carbonate) made it more palatable. These days, serious chocolatiers know how to dry, ferment, and roast their beans better, so I, at least, find the dutching unnecessary. (Some pretty high falutin’ culinary people don’t agree).   Dutching adds an alkaline taste, and sabotages some of the toasty, caramel nuances that you are looking for to begin with…add this insult to the cacao solids, which have already been depleted when the cocoa butter was sieved away.  Dutching makes cocoa powder darker, and people are therefore misleaded into thinking that it’s richer as well. Observe, if you will, an Oreo:  the cocoa therein has been heavily dutched, and it’s almost black.   Then check out some Cacao Barry or some Scharffen Berger cocoas; they are pale, reddish, and substantially more vibrant and nuanced in taste than their dutched but darker relatives.  The acidity of natural cocoa is also helpful in certain recipes, as it combines well with baking soda and helps with the creation of the leavening carbon dioxide.

If you let your HC rest, leisurely reheat it in a heavy saucepan, enameled if you have one.  If you have flavored your mixture with other flavoring elements, leave them in or not, depending on the intensity you are looking for. In my selfless research, I have gone pretty far afield, adding stuff like vanilla beans, orange peel, star anise, lavender, five spice powder, black pepper and tarragon (not for the kids), cardamom, and a variety of chilies.  Play around with these as you see fit. I love a pinch of cayenne or ground chipotle, with a minimum of sweetener, à la Maya.  Vanilla goes hand in hand with chocolate, as does a little finely ground Italian roast coffee.  It’s always good to have some vanilla sugar in your larder.  Just take the time to split a vanilla bean lengthwise and bury it in a canister of sugar white or brown.  Really far flung additions like bay leaves, saffron or rose buds left me cold, but intrigued, and I don’t regret the effort an iota. I made a Swedish white hot chocolate with orange peel and vanilla. I made an haute Parisian version that demanded a half-teaspoon of confectioner’s sugar and a ramequin of whipped cream served on the side. Claire terrain.  I made a fastidiously detailed but straightforward British HC that called for four ounces of bittersweet chocolate melted in a half and half combination of cream and whole milk, sieved and rested overnight. ‘Twas deep and velvety and devastatingly rich.  I think it might be excellent with a big dollop of whipped cream to lighten it a bit (!), but you must ingest it by the spoonful, as you must with Italian and Spanish versions that I tried, which are thickened even further with a little cornstarch slurry.  These are hyper indulgent, spoon-stands-up-in –it variations… and it’s nice to think about urbane Barcelonans sipping such chocolate with their churros as the sun come up.

        We have a selection of prepared hot chocolate options for you over in Specialty Foods. These are tablets of pre-sweetened and flavored chocolate that you melt in your milk or water, then whip up or aerate as you see fit.   We carry the classic Mexican “Ibarra”, in its brilliant red and yellow box, which has a pleasant amount of cinnamon. I like to make that with mostly water and then float a little cream on top. Recently we acquired the Spanish Blanxart “Chocolate a la Taza”, with its jazzy blue and white wrapper that has a graphic of a bemused medieval character piping out some chocolate lozenges, as they used to be called, and the pithy advice “Drink it Hot-Eat it Raw”.  Lastly, we now have the Cioccolata Modicana bars from the Casa Don Puglisi.  Available in vanilla or chili, beautifully packaged, and described in effusive Italian on their little attached cards, these are worth the price.  They’re made with high quality chocolate, lightly sweetened, and well infused with vanilla or pepper. The Italians do some AMAZING things with chocolate, and a dear new Friend from the grocery department bestows several darkest varieties upon me every time she goes to Turin. I am infinitely blessed, and I speak not only of the chocolate…   

I have settled on, ultimately, about six ounces of Valrhona Gastronomie melted in two cups of water and three of whole milk with a heaping tablespoon of Cacao Barry and a teaspoon of good organic vanilla.   Simmer that together for about five minutes, never letting it boil (once you get those delicate wisps of steam and that first lazy bubble popping on the surface, turn the heat down and stir with your whip, getting deep into the corners of your pan). Experts advise that you never let your chocolate go over 180°F.  Look out the window and listen to your music…Mozart seems good this year, as do Rachmaninoff and Ben Webster.  If you have the time, and you should, turn off the heat and let the affair cool for at least an hour.  Then reheat leisurely.

Find your own special variation in the possibilities above. Use water, milk or cream, or any combination thereof.  Try bittersweet, semisweet or milk chocolate. Add cocoa or do not.  Melt some Nutella or one of its variants in some hot milk and serve it with whipped cream. Make a ganache of chocolate and cream, flavoring it as you will, and keep it on hand—just melts it in milk at your convenience.   Add a profusion of chili powder or lavender or orange liqueur to your infusion. Jacques Torres, at his new chocolate emporium in downtown Manhattan, serves his HC laced with anchos and chipotles, and Jacques sure knows his chocolate.  Experiment with pistachio, hazelnut or chestnut purée. Go Viennese with a big dollop of shlag (softly whipped cream) and a dusting of cinnamon.  Find some extravagant long cinnamon sticks and use them as stirrers-- they are re-usable. One night, deep in research, I had both the cocoa elixir method and the Valrhona approach going, and splattered the lighter version with the dark.  I wondered about excess, and the Olmecs who had discovered the magical cacao and introduced it to the Mayans.  Do your thing.  Elizabeth David, a favorite gastronome, says, “As everybody knows, there is only one infallible recipe for the perfect omelette: your own.”  We can certainly apply that to a cup of chocolate.  At HWFC, we have all the ingredients you need for your own big, perfect cup.

I like to do that wintry supper that Colette suggests, above, and take the chocolate and some buttered toast to bed with the Wednesday Times (you know what section). (A jazzy variation on this hot-chocolate-toast theme is the au courant Chocolate Panini: simply make a grilled sourdough and bittersweet chocolate sandwich, using unsalted butter. Weigh it down in your iron frying pan with another heavy pan, or use your panini maker.  Bake both sides  ‘til the chocolate melts.   You can dust the crusty, golden result with a little confectioner’s sugar if you’ve got company. The chocolate melts luxuriantly, and tends to drip, so don’t take this to bed with you). If it’s early enough I leave the shades up so I can watch the last rays of the sun deliquesce like the froth in the cup of chocolate.  Be aware of the synesthesia here: all your senses can embrace a good hot chocolate, even including the sounds of the bubbles of the foam dissolving. Find a radio station that you can trust to play good classical or jazz all night long. Doze. Read a paragraph, take a sip, noting the silky texture in the cooling chocolate, then doze some more.  Hot chocolate is both comforting and energizing, so you might even make some headway in Infinite Jest. Or not.   As always, I urge you to make a cocoa that nurtures you, to savor and share at your leisure, with love.