My Successful Attempt on the Chocolate Fondant - from MasterChef Australia

After our lovely breakfast at Bird Cow Fish yesterday, my husband & I visited the NSW State Library to see the annual photography exhibition World Press Photo 2010. A collection of inspiring and breathtaking images taken by amazing photographers from all over the world.

We then head home, spending our lazy Saturday watching the prerecorded MasterChef show that I missed from the previous night. I became alert as soon as Gary said that he will be teaching the contestants on how to make chocolate fondant. After listening to him intently and concluded that this is a pretty easy dessert to make, I started with my very own MasterChallenge.

To be honest, it was very easy to make. The only thing that you have to be mindful of is the timing of the chocolate fondant in the oven. It took me 11-12 minutes for the chocolate fondant to bake perfectly in the oven and achieve a gooey chocolatey sauce inside. It is a very rich dessert and best eaten warm when the outer layer is still spongy and oozing in the middle. Be generous with the Amaretto if you like to have an intense alcohol flavour in your dessert. Also, I was unable to get hold of the Amaretto from the local liquor shop and used Kahlua instead. 

Recipe taken from the MasterChef website

Serves 6

Ingredients

Melted butter, for greasing
Cocoa powder, for greasing
200g dark couverture chocolate
200g butter, chopped
4 eggs
4 egg yolks
100g caster sugar
150g plain flour. sifted
100g butter, extra
100 g cocoa powder

625ml milk
5 egg yolks
40g caster sugar
1 vanilla bean
2 tbs amaretto



Method

Step 1: For the fondant, preheat oven to 180C. Place a small square of paper in the bottom of 6 ramekins and grease with melted butter and cocoa powder. Place ramekin on a baking tray.

Step 2: Melt the chocolate and butter in a bowl over a small saucepan of boiling water, turn off heat. In an electric mixer, add the eggs, egg yolks and sugar and mix on high speed until fluffy and white. Tip chocolate mixture into a large bowl, pour egg mixture into chocolate mixture and fold together. Fold in flour and mix until smooth. Spoon or pour mixture into ramekins and place in fridge until ready to serve. When ready to serve, bake in over for 8-9 minutes.

Step 3: For the milkshake, place 500ml milk in a small saucepan over medium heat. Meanwhile, cream egg yolks and sugar together with a whisk. Split vanilla bean in half, scrape seeds out and add the bean along with the seeds to the milk. Once it comes to the boil, pour half onto the yolk mixture, and then pour the mixture back into the saucepan, whisking constantly. Place over low heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon. Continue cooking until the mixture coats the back of a spoon, then strain into a bowl and cool over ice. Pour anglaise into a jug and place in the fridge for about an hour.

Step 4: Add 250ml of the anglaise, remaining milk and amaretto to a large jug. Froth with coffee machine steamer or a hand blender until thick and frothy.

Step 5: To serve, gently run knife along outside of each ramekin and turn fondant out into serving bowls. Spoon amaretto milkshake around the fondant and serve.