Monday, April 09, 2007



An excursion into foodblogging

It's Easter, and as I mentioned earlier, for me Easter is about chocolate - so I tried my hand at making chocalatl. There are a number of recipes floating round on the web for variants of the original Aztec chocolate drink, both hot and cold, and with varying levels of authenticity (including one which uses cocoa and canned chicken stock. Bloody Americans), but the general components seem to be chocolate and chilli, with a dash of cinnamon and vanilla, and optional honey. In the end I went for milk (the Aztecs would have used water), stuck some honey and a cinnamon stick in it, and melted in a few rows of bittersweet. When it had melted, I sprinkled in some ground cinnamon and chilli powder, and frothed it with an egg whisk. The result was... interesting. Zingy. And probably worth doing again - though next time I won't use quite so much chilli powder.

Posted by Idiot/Savant at 4/09/2007 10:53:00 PM

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10 comments:

Yay! Food blogging! But cocoa and canned chicken stock... ACK!

Schock make a chocolate bar with chilli in it. Mm,Mmm, Good.

 Posted by Amanda : 4/09/2007 11:10:00 PM

Sorry, what does "Bloody Americans" have to do with a aebsite called "fooddownunder". You are obsessed with the US aren't you? Remember there are 300 million Americans from San Francisco to Alabama and it makes very little sense, in a cultural context, to even use the word "Americans". I think you use it instead of "Jews".

 Posted by Anonymous : 4/10/2007 06:21:00 AM

lol. actually... jews make better food than americans. but thanks for the record time to godwin a thread. you dick...

good post i/s. glad to see you branching out a little. the world is bigger than the fight for liberalism. let me know if you need a good recipe for vietnamese rice paper rolls (they make better food than the americans too... )

 Posted by Anonymous : 4/10/2007 07:05:00 AM

I'm sure someone from Brazil or Canada will point out that there are over a billion (guess) Americans from Tierra del Fuego to Baffin Island.

Argentina brings us excellent steak, Mexico a whole range of great food, not to mention West Indian goat curry. Plus a whole lot of ethnic food like pizza and chop suey that was actually invented in America.

 Posted by Rich : 4/10/2007 09:13:00 AM

Anon: the recipe is quite widely spread - here and here and here; the original source indeed seems to be American. More generally, its entirely in keeping with a food culture which thinks cheese comes out of a spraycan and peanut butter is a major food group.

Of course, most of those toying with better recipes are Americans too - but they're the exception rather than the rule.

Che: The narrow focus on politics is a deliberate choice, and one I don't want to stray too far from. My broader life is simply not for public consumption.

 Posted by Idiot/Savant : 4/10/2007 10:38:00 AM

cheese doesn't come out of a spraycan?

liar...

 Posted by Anonymous : 4/10/2007 10:57:00 AM

cheese doesn't come out of a spraycan?

Real cheese doesn't. Real cheese also has types other than white, yellow, and bright orange.

 Posted by Idiot/Savant : 4/10/2007 11:08:00 AM

In fairness, I can recall seeing bitter chocolate discussed as an ingredient in some kind of chicken recipie that seemed not-ungenuine. And, probably little more arbitrarily, as a bonus ingredient for chilli con carne.

And yes, trying Schock's range is a great cure for assuming things don't go with chocolate. Not that there's chicken.

It may have been in Australia, there was one place I went to serves espresso cups full of hot syrupy chocolate liquor with (or without) chilli. Squirt of whipped cream and a decorative chilli everyone was told they didn't want to eat. More chocolatey than Sunday.

I don't know if it's relevant, but if things are still as they were in the US when I was there as a kid, their 'cooking chocolate' is entirely unsweetened. Hence, most people have childhood horror stories about sneaking into the pantry and biting of a large chuck of unmitigated bitterness.

 Posted by Lyndon : 4/10/2007 12:46:00 PM

Lyndon: I have a number of recipies for savoury chilli dishes which use a bit of chocolate to enhance the flavour; its the idea of making chocalatl with cocoa and chicken stck thats rather sickening.

(And yes, chocolate and chilli also go together when sweet; I've had some very good chocolate chilli cakes).

 Posted by Idiot/Savant : 4/10/2007 01:29:00 PM

Re: spraycan "cheese". Paint can come in a spraycan, food _never_ can. As every good kiwi kid knows, cheese comes from cows.

Sleek, fat, happy cows fed on sun warmed grass and sweet fresh hay. That's where cheese comes from.

Ahhh... cheese. New Zealanders know good cheese.

 Posted by Muerk : 4/10/2007 02:31:00 PM

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