Recipe: Easy French Chocolate Fondant

Ah the French, they do marvelous things with chocolate. And not just chocolate either - I have learned countless easy but flashy looking French cooking techniques since I've been here in Polynesia and I now devoutly kneel before the wisdom of French food savvy. Today is my daughter's 14th birthday (ouch!) and she's asked me to make one of her favorite cakes in my recipe arsenal, Chocolate Fondant, a rich gooey cake kind of like chocolate brownies but more sophisticated. This recipe was given to me by a Parisian friend and even manages to wow my French dinner guests. Keep it a secret that it's so ridiculously easy to make.

The trick to this cake is to not over-cook it and not to skimp on the butter.

Easy French Chocolate Fondant

• 50g (1/2 cup) plain flour
• 200g (7/8th cup) butter
• 200g (7/8th cup) sugar
• 200g (7 oz) dark chocolate
• 4 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla, strong coffee or orange zest (optional)

Preheat oven to 200 C (about 390 F or gas mark 7). With a whisk mix together the sugar and eggs. Add the flour and mix till smooth. Put the butter in a 9-inch round (or equivalent) pan and put it in the heating oven till the butter has just melted. Meanwhile melt the chocolate in a bain marie (a pot floating in a slightly bigger pot of boiling water). Make sure no water splashes into the chocolate. Take the melted butter in the pan out of the oven, add the melted chocolate to the butter in the pan, mix till smooth then add the egg, sugar and flour mixture. If you are adding vanilla, coffee or orange zest for a more complex flavor, add them now. Again, mix till smooth. Put the batter-filled the pan back in the oven and cook for 7-10 minutes. The center should look slightly uncooked - if it looks cooked you've left it in too long. The fondant is best eaten cold to slightly warm and is great with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.

Photo note: I'm not a professional food blogger so my photo isn't as flashy as you'll find on many food sites but, believe me, the recipe is just as good.

Recipe: Perfect Anywhere Brownies

I love brownies but here in Tahiti I was never able to make them just right. The flour is somehow different, you can't get baker's chocolate or chocolate chips and nuts cost a fortune. So, I was very happy to find this, the most basic of recipes that gives the most splendid fudgy on the inside, crinkly and chewy on the outside brownie. The ingredients are so ordinary and this is so easy that you could make these just about anywhere on the planet. I could even make these out on Ahe where there isn't even a flushing toilet! Seriously, this is one for the road.

Now this is a fancy suggestion, and not useful if you're in the Sahara, a remote atoll or the like, but my husband has a wheat allergy so I tried these with gluten free flour (I use Bob's Red Mill All-Purpose GF Flour) and they were even chewier, gooier and delicious than usual. I usually make the brownies without chocolate chips/chunks or nuts because I don't have these available to me but the addition of either or both of these brings the whole brownie experience to another level. Enjoy!

The World's Easiest and Best Brownies

¾ cup butter

1 ½ cups sugar (I use raw sugar)

2 eggs

3 tsp vanilla, rum or very strong dark coffee (depending on what you have available - or nothing)

½ cup 100% cocoa (NOT hot chocolate mix, you need unsweetened pure chocolate cocoa)

¾ cup plain flour (NOT self-raising)

1 tsp salt

¾ cup nuts (optional)

½ cup chocolate chips or dark chocolate cut into small, coarse pieces (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and grease a 9 inch baking dish.

Melt the butter slowly in a medium sized saucepan. When it's melted, remove from heat and stir in sugar. Give it a few stirs and let the sugar dissolve into the cooling butter for a few minutes. Add in the eggs and vanilla (rum or coffee). Beat until smooth. Add the cocoa and flour (I crush all the lumps with a fork and haven't found I needed to sift) and stir for 1-2 minutes, until the batter is smooth and shiny. Stir in chocolate chips/chunks and/or nuts. Pour the batter into the baking dish and bake for about 20-25 minutes, until the top just begins to loose its liquid look. You're much better off undercooking these than overcooking so pay attention and keep checking on them - if you overcook them they'll get cake-like instead of fudgy.