Cherry Poppin’ Chocolate Pots

lovinmanchester

Ingredients

(makes 2)
10 mls brandy
250 mls double cream
175 grms top quality milk chocolate
20 grms caster sugar
100 grms top quality dark chocolate
Fresh cherries
White chocolate for garnish

Some reckon that oysters are an aphrodisiac, while others claim that asparagus is the deal sealer…..they might be, but they have nothing and I mean nothing on this chocolate cherry-popper. So with that in mind, I am gonna slap a warning on this recipe….’it will drop knickers at 20 paces so be careful who you are serving this up to on Valentine’s Day…….’

Instructions

Step 1

Blow up some balloons until they are about the same size as a giant Spanish onion and gave them a little rub with some veg oil…don’t go nuts, just a super thin film.

Step 2

Break up the dark chocolate and drop into a glass bowl – the smaller the bits, the quicker they melt.

Step 3

You can melt the chocolate over boiling water or in the microwave. To be honest, the microwave is the easiest option but do it in blasts of about 20 seconds and stir well after each blast.

Step 4

Line a wide baking tray with greaseproof paper and spoon a little bit of the melted dark chocolate onto it to form the base of the chocolate pot.

Step 5

Next dunk the balloons into the chocolate – 3-4 coatings to make sure you have a thick enough ‘pot’. Set the balloons ass down on their base, hold until they take, then sling them straight into the fridge for at least 1 hour to set solid.

Step 6

To make the filling, whip up the double cream, sugar and brandy to stiff peaks.

Step 7

As you did with the dark chocolate, melt the milk chocolate and then leave it to cool for about 3-4 minutes. After that add to the cream and whip them together until a velvety. At this stage you can check the flavour – more brandy or sugar? Also, a little trick here if you want to darken the mix just add a little cocoa powder.

Step 8

Spoon the mix into a piping bag and put into the fridge to set up a little, around 10 minutes will do it.

Step 9

Next, get the pot out of the fridge and pop the balloons – they should come away from the chocolate with a little encouragement and patience. To finish, simply pipe the pots full of the milk chocolate, pop a cherry on top and scatter with ‘scraped’ white chocolate.