Part paté choux, part cookie, part cake, this light and chocolate-y treat pairs whole-grain quinoa flour, black cocoa and sweet chocolate chunks.
Yield: 4, one-ounce snacks or desserts
Time to make: 40 minutes active. Overnight refrigeration. 35 minute oven dwell.
Tools needed: Large stoneware bowl. Medium prep bowl. Silicon spatula. Electric mixer with whisk attachment. Plastic wrap. Sharp knife. 2-quart saucepan. Measuring cups and spoons and/or scale. Sheet pan with bakers parchment.
Ingredients
Procedure:
1) In a medium bowl, mix flour, cocoa, and xanthan gum, stirring until well blended. Place the milk in a small saucepan and add the sugar, the salt and the butter. Place saucepan over medium heat and bring to a light boil. Remove from heat, add the flour/cocoa mix all at once and stir with a silicon spatula to make a cohesive dough. Return to heat and cook the dough until it begins to stick to the bottom of the saucepan, then remove from heat and transfer dough to the stoneware bowl.
2) Allow the dough to cool to between 120 - 135 F. This will take about 3 minutes if you move the dough around from one side of the bowl to the other so that heat is removed by the coolness of the bowl. Add one egg to the bowl and, stirring with the power mixer on medium speed, beat until a cohesive dough forms. Add the second egg and do the same.
3) Place a piece of plastic wrap onto your work surface. Spritz lightly with cooking oil. Turn dough out onto this and use a lightly-oiled spatula to shape dough into a rectangle. Cover with the plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.
4) Heat oven to 425. Remove chocolate squares to room temperature and slice each into thirds. Prepare a sheet pan by lining with bakers parchment. Spritz the parchment lightly with cooking oil.
5) Remove dough from refrigerator but keep it in the plastic wrap. Place on a plastic work surface. Using a rolling pin, preferably with sizing rings, roll the dough within the plastic wrap to a slab that is 1/2 inch thick and about 6 inches wide by 12 inches long. Gently remove the top layer of plastic - it will want to stick to the dough but a gentle, steady pull will prevail.
6) Using a sharp knife, divide the dough into four equal rectangles, each about 3 inches wide by 6 inches long. Knife will slice dough and dough will appear to re-fuse. It has not. Position slices of chocolate squares along the bottom edge of the dough. Gently lift the plastic wrap from below to roll dough up over chocolate chunks. Add another layer of chunks and continue rolling dough until you've got a log. ("Looks like a Tootsie Roll," my wife says.) Cut away most of the plastic wrap so that you can roll each piece separately onto the parchment, spacing them widely as you do.
7) Bake the Mutts for 10 minutes, then reduce heat to 350 and bake another 25 minutes. Remove to a cooling rack and allow to cool completely before enjoying.