Chocolate Pudding
13 Comments
Greetings from the Lake Austin Spa! (You won't believe this place. Check it out here.)
Bruce and I are teaching cooking classes from our new book, REAL FOOD HAS CURVES (which you can find here).
Mostly, we're enjoying this view from our room: the Colorado river, winding through the canyon, the flowers in abundance around us, the gorgeous afternoon sun making things lazy and peaceful.
These are our first classes from the book--and we're already getting a great response. I can't wait to hear what you will say about it.
Especially about the chocolate pudding, the way the second step of the plan starts off, the one about relishing everything you eat.
For a while, we thought about subtitling the book "Chocolate Pudding Will Save Your Life."
We did a taste test in class today: real chocolate pudding, a shelf-stable chocolate pudding, and an "instant" chocolate pudding, no cooking required. We discussed how simple flavors bring out real satisfaction--and how more pleasure in every bite is the key to eating less at every turn.
Look, everyone's got the bad news: everything in the supermarket will somehow kill you. But it's just not true. So we wrote this book so that real people could go to the real supermarket--not just the fancy upscale one--and get real food onto their tables and so perhaps live longer, weigh less, and love every bite.
To that end, chocolate pudding will save your life!
First, whisk 2 large eggs in a big bowl until they're creamy and uniform--a good 3 or 4 minutes.
Next, put all this in a big saucepan: 2 cups low-fat milk, 1/3 cup packed light brown sugar, 1/4 cup cocoa powder, 1/4 cup all-purpose flour, 1 ounce chipped up unsweetened or baking chocolate, 2 teaspoons vanilla extract, and 1/4 teaspoon salt.
Clean and dry that whisk, then use it (as Bruce is doing before class) to whisk all this over medium heat just until the chocolate melts and the mixture starts to bubble in the pan.
Whisk about half the chocolate mixture into the beaten eggs, then whisk this combined mixture back into the saucepan. Drop the heat to low and whisk just until the first bubble, no more than a minute or so.
Pour this mixture into a bowl and chill for about three hours in the fridge. It won't be plastic-y. It won't be fake. It will be soft and luscious. Big tastes like this bring on more satiety in every bite. And that's the key to eating less and weighing less. More pleasure in every bite. It seems like a good plan to me.
Reader Comments (13)
I don't even eat pudding but now I think I might. I'm going to read all the blog while I wait for my copy of "Curves" to get here from Amazon Prime. :D Great to discover you guys!
Great to discover you, too, Penelope! I can't wait to hear what you think about the book.
Mark
Love the book so far you guys. I am jumping aropund a bit - the oil section is great, I have been so confused by saturated fat (as you know!) that my head spins. I like the idea of other oils and your intro to them is just what I need.
I think I need some serious "diet undo" thinking and your book is helping.
The last time I dropped weight it was on a diet named for a beach community in Florida - now I did lose weight but regained to where I was at before I lost - carbs - love them, and I know I need to find a way to keep them in my life even though many folks say they are unhealthy - even the whole grain ones. I haven't read what you have to say about carbs yet and now I need to go clean the goat barn.
But- I love what I have read so far and with books I love I almost hate to read them because I don't want to finish them (weird I know) so it is on my bedstand , chapter by chapter slowly, I am trying not to rip right through it.
OK- gotta scoop the poop and get a review on amazon when I finish.
You two should be very proud of this work.
Take crae.
G
Go you good things! (That's Aussie vernacular, by the way.. :))
Your chocolate pudding sounds delicious, and I hope you noticed that I went on a quest to find unsweetened chocolate to make your recipes with. In the end I discovered 100% Belgian unsweetened chocolate (Callebaut cocoa mass) in callet form, perfect for cooking. I wish I could be at one of your cooking classes...I'd sit at the table like a little kid and bang my fork and spoon up and down and chant, "chocolate pudding! chocolate pudding!" over and over until you fed me... :D
Hi! I just found you site today. I wonder how you reconcile this recipe with the recent "healthy fats" post. Wouldn't "low-fat milk" be considered a "not-quite-real food", or however your terminology puts it?
Reduced fat *anything* is generally more processed than the "real" food. Dairy fats, especially when from organically raised grass-fed cows (whenever you can get it!) are actually pretty "good" fats. It's just butter, after all, right? (ie, butter is just the milk fat separated out from the milk)
All to do with the satiety and brain stimulation fats provide etc... With 'reduced fat', we actually end up eating more because we're not as "satisfied". I don't think it's any coincidence that the heftiest people tend to eat the most "reduced fat" and "sugar-free" foods!
Hey, guys. Sorry I've been away. The road is hard on communication.
Greg: Take it slowly. Rome wasn't built in a day. Dinner either.
Celia: You're just so great!
Heather: As we detail in the book, not all "processing" is by nature bad. If so, I'd be advocating for raw milk (which I drink--but that's another matter entirely). Low-fat isn't bad, particularly when it has full satiety, as in this pudding. Nothing has changed chemically in the milk, other than some of the fat being removed. But if you want to make it with whole milk, go ahead by all means!
M.
I love your beautiful pics! I prefer to keep things simple...I try to eat or drink something as close to the way that God made it; of course with milk, pasteurization is better than raw.
Love the chocolate pudding!!! Never had homemade pudding before - didn't even know it was possible. I'll never go back to the box!
However, I made a batch to bring to work to try to turn my co-workers on to real food and what did they do? They found a can of spray whipped cream and candy sprinkles to put on top of it! There's really no hope for some people.
Michelle:
Ha! I'm glad you liked it. Thanks so much for joining us on the blog. I look forward to a lot more of that wry sense of humor. (Mostly, to compete with my natural snark.)
But actually, according to our real food plan, whipped cream in a can might be "almost real food" and therefore totally acceptable. If there's nothing but cream in the can--and then the spray propellent (which is none too good for the environment)--it would certainly be within one of the acceptable categories on the plan.
But as to sprinkles. . . .
M.
Hi guys!
I started reading Real Food Has Curves last night an almost every page is now dog eared! I started on a real food journey of my own in June....I wanted to change the way that I approached eating. A lot of quinoa, fruit and trips to the gym later I have been able to sustain it and I don't even miss the treats and junk that I used to eat everyday. I also lost 16 lbs!! It has been easy to maintain since it isn't a diet, it's a way of thinking and I believe in it!
I made your Minestrone Burgers tonight and they are delicious! I also made the chocolate pudding and fingers crossed that it will set soon! It has been an hour already but I see that you say 3 hours above here!!
Thanks for the great book....I am going to now follow this blog now that I know it exists!!
Bari:
Thank you for your very kind words. I think that book is the most heartfelt we've ever written.
That chocolate pudding has befuddled quite a lot of people. It all has to do with how far you cook it. A lot of people have taken the milk off and beat it into the eggs too early. Really let it go until it's almost as thick as premium, melted gelato. Then it'll set up!
Hope that helps.
M.
Thanks for getting back to me Mark...I tried again last night and ended up with chocolate soup for the second time :(
Really not a big deal because chocolate soup is pretty yummy and we all eat it anyway....I think that I was afraid of burning the milk....I will give it one more shot and heat the whole thing up a little bit more!
Last night I made the chicken puttanesca....so fast and so easy! I used oil cured black olives from the italian specialty store but I assume I could have used the canned ones in water? I also made the lemon chicken and that was equally delicious! I had lunch for me and 2 grateful co-workers today! I love sharing my new healthy recipes that have discovered...and I have told many people about your great book!
Thanks again!
Bari: It is an art, but don't be afraid of cooking the milk. The flour has to change molecular composition in order to thicken the stuff. Go farther than you think--and then strain it through a fine-mesh sieve. Once you get it, you'll have it--like riding a bike. But I wish I were there to make it for you!
M.