Tuesday, December 22, 2020

Yes, Creamy Vegan Chocolate Pudding , And Is It Too Early For a New Years Resolution...Asking For A Friend

    Well, we're already almost at the end of by all accounts...the worst year ever...almost. I'm not going to count all the millennia of volcanic eruptions, dinosaur destruction, war, famine and all the rest. I'm just talking in recent memory, okay, my recent memory if we're being exact. I've had bad years just like everyone else.  Cancer, writers strikes, injuries, family deaths, personal disappointments, breakups, you name it. But you know that old saying when people are excited and happy about something,.. "it's like all  my birthdays came at once" ? Yeah, well this year is the opposite of that. 

   Speaking of birthdays I spent mine this last year in isolation with covid. I was sick for two months and change, but I did emerge from the other side alive, only a little bit worse for wear, and I didn't manage to infect anyone else in the family. I had two hospital visits, one to the ER in March at the start and another for them to do an endoscopy at the end of it all in May. I was very lucky.

   On the other hand, I did start baking sourdough made form my own starter. From scratch. Since I've been back on my feet, I've been back to work writing, and we haven't had an "outside meal" even takeout since February so it's been hard to blog when it seems like I'm either at the stove or in the office every day, all day. My New Years Resolution therefore is to get back to posting more.

    I had big plans for this year, and when the shutdown happened I thought, great, I can post a lot more recipes, there will be more time. And then in the first week of March I got covid and so was sidelined for two months, and then it was hard to get back to cooking. I was tired. And when we went back at work and I was writing all day, then cooking what seemed like all day, the energy to post was gone.

   But now, I'm back and I'm determined to share a lot of the stuff I've been experimenting with during this plague time, and this recipe is one I spotted online in the NYT, and since  it featured Oat Milk, (my new favorite) I had to try it and I'm passing this great recipe along. I buy Oatly Oat Milk which is shelf stable in my fridge for months at a time so I can have this any time at all. Did I mention it makes up super quickly?  It does. Which is handy because I've found it disappears just as quickly.

 

Oat Milk Chocolate Pudding

 

Here's What You Need :

1/4 cup of unsweetened cocoa. I try and find the best I can, usually its Valrhona cocoa

3 and 1/2 TBs corn starch

1/3 cup sugar

1/8 tsp kosher salt

2 cups unsweetened oat milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 oz chocolate chips or just plain chopped chocolate (dairy free or regular depending on how you want to go with this)


Here's What To Do:

 Assemble your ingredients.

The first time I made this pudding I used Oatlys Barista Blend because that's all I had on hand, after that I just used regular unsweetened oat milk, and  it worked beautifully.

Sift your cocoa and cornstarch through a sieve into a medium heavy saucepan

Stir in sugar and salt using a silicone spatula or spoon.

Add in 1/4 of the milk and stir until the mixture in the pot forms a paste.

Like this.

When you have your paste, start slowly stirring in the rest of the milk.

Cook the pudding mix over a medium heat, stirring constantly with the spatula. The mixture will turn thick and bubbly. This takes about 6-8 minutes

Take the pot off the heat and add in the vanilla...

...and your chopped chocolate bits.

Stir the chocolate bits into the hot pudding mix.

When it's all melted together, pour it into serving dishes and press some cling film onto the top to keep it for forming a skin.

Pop it into the fridge...and bingo. You are done!

As soon as it chills, enjoy.

I like serving this with a nice glass of cutting chai made with Assam tea flavored with ginger, cardamom, cloves, and some other spices. I've lately been buying my tea from a grower in India VahdamTeas

If you are into tea, I've found them to be excellent. Where I live its difficult to get good loose leaf tea  and a couple of quick glasses of chai in the afternoon are the perfect pick me up.

Hoping everyone has a safe, and sane Holiday season and New Year. We'll be eating and skyping with family, and I'll be popping up with more recipes, more often. And I'll also be firing up the old tandoor on a  regular basis. So the coming year should be one of feasting and hopefully as we get vaccinated we'll all be able to gather again with family and friends. At least the amount of dishes and gear I'll be washing after Christmas dinner will be a lot less this year, or so I keep telling myself.

 Here's to a MUCH BETTER 2021 for us, everyone! And as my mom used to say back in the 90's......




2 comments :

  1. Oh, my. Just oh, my. This is now on my to make list. Sounds delicious

    ReplyDelete
  2. I always love your new additions and this one is over the top! I wish all the best in the coming year also, we are surely went back in time to 1917 to our grandparents day that handled this ordeal, glad were are still here to talk about it but your right its not done. Here's to more love laughs and good food have the best season for the reason all the best to you and yours

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