Chocolate and chillies are a natural combination and a little heat brings out the best in the chocolate. You could use oranges or clementines instead of mandarin oranges.
Recipe courtesy of Lucy Waverman, Food Author and Columnist.
ingredients
Chocolate Pot De Crème
Mandarin Chilli Syrup
directions
Add 1/2 cup milk into a pot. Sprinkle gelatine over milk. Dissolve slowly on low heat, stirring occasionally. Reserve. If gelatine becomes solid again, reheat to liquefy.
Combine remaining milk, cream and sugar. Bring to boil, reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in gelatine mixture, chocolate and cocoa powder. Whisk until well combined. Cool, stirring occasionally, until room temperature.
Strain in custard into 6 x 1-cup lightly oiled ramekins. Chill for 2 hours or longer or until set. Drizzle over Mandarin chilli syrup.
Cut mandarins in half and squeeze out juice to make 1/3 cup juice. Cut peels in half again.
Combine corn syrup, sugar, water, mandarin quarters and chilli halves in a saucepan and stir over low heat until sugar dissolves. Bring to boil.
Reduce heat to medium and continue to cook, swirling pan occasionally, for 30-35 minutes or until syrup becomes a pale golden colour. Pour in reserved orange juice and cook, stirring constantly for 2 minutes or until caramel has come together to form a syrup.
Remove pan from heat. Pour syrup into a heatproof bowl and remove mandarin peel quarters. Set aside to cool.
Once syrup is cool, remove chilli and mince, and return it to syrup if desired. If caramel is too firm to stir, add a little warm water and stir over low heat until well-combined and syrup has a thick, pouring consistency.
Serve pot de crème drizzled with orange and chilli syrup.