Baked Sunday Mornings: S’More-Style Chocolate Whiskey Pudding

A Gentleman’s Dessert

This week’s Baked Sunday Mornings challenge, S’More-Style Chocolate Whiskey Pudding, is the very last recipe from Baked Elements!  I joined this wonderful on-line baking group in May 2011 with Cowboy Cookies from Baked Explorations, and now, 91 postings later, we’re wrapping up a second book (their 3rd).  It’s been an amazing journey!  I share administrative duties for the group with Sheri of Pork Cracklins and Celine of Boubonnatrix Bakes.  Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito interact with us regularly and are so supportive of everything we do.  This wonderful journey is like a treasure hunt that keeps revealing more and more prizes along the way.  We were all invited to participate in home testing recipes for their 4th book, Baked Occasions which was just released – ta-tah – with my picture in it as a “Badass Recipe Tester!”  We begin baking from Baked Occasions right away.  If you would like to join us, simply order your copy and follow the schedule, posting the link to your creations every other Sunday Morning.

Ah, but I digress!  This was the perfect recipe for the grande finale from Baked Elements.  It is so rich and creamy, layered with flavors and textures that just dance on your tongue.  The Gentlemen Bakers always encourage us to use high quality ingredients, so John made this treat with Glenmorangie Single Malt Scotch Whisky.  It has an earthy, peaty finish that pairs perfectly with dark chocolate (we used Lindt 70% Dark Chocolate).

The cinnamon-scented graham cracker crumbs provide a bit of crunchiness to this rich, smooth pudding. Understanding that the point was an ultra-elegant riff on S’Mores we think next time (and there will be a next time!) we would layer the pudding with butter-toasted pecans instead.

Neither one of us is a big fan of marshmallows, but we wanted to learn how to make the topping, because, after all, that’s the whole point of belonging to this group – to learn & try new things!  Well, it was a super sticky mess that never firmed up to the “stiff peaks” point.  The recipe said this would occur after about 8 minutes.  Thirty minutes later, we decided to stop whipping the marshmallow topping.  I’m sure that it’s firmed up after spending the night in the refrigerator.  After all of that, we didn’t think it added anything to the pudding except excessive sweetness, so we pushed it aside and continued to enjoy our wonderfully rich chocolate-whisky pudding.

This dessert is so rich that it would be perfect served in diminutive vessels, like espresso demitasse cups.  John, of course, enjoyed his with a nip of Glenmorangie!

Sweet Dreams!

Edinburgh Castle, Scotland