Chocolate Blinis

For May's Chocolate With Francois challenge, Linda at Diva Weigh selected Chocolate Blinis. Traditionally, blinis are made with yeast and are served with caviar and sour cream, but in this case, they are leavened with whipped egg whites, and are definitely more sweet than savoury. Essentially, these are light, fluffy little pancakes, that are incredibly chocolatey.

The batter came together quite easily; melted chocolate and butter is stirred into an egg and sugar mixture, dry ingredients and ground hazelnuts are folded in, followed by whipped eggs whites. A short rest in the fridge and the blinis are ready to be cooked!

Cooking the blinis proved to be a bit more challenging than expected though. Even with the pan over the lowest flame, they had a tendency to burn, or if they weren't burnt, they were still too raw to flip. That picture up top?  Ya, that's the only blini that turned out presentable... that's why ther's only one on the plate.  After almost a dozen blinis turned out mishapened and burnt, I changed gears and started heating up the waffle baker. The waffle blinis turned out much much better. They were crisp and light and perfectly browned.

Since these were going to be a dessert, I whipped up a bit of cream to serve on top. Then inspiration called and I remembered the new flavour of jam that I had recently spied at the grocery store. Bonne Maman's Mandarin Jam is a lovely marmalade, yet it's not overly bitter like so many marmalades can be. A few tablespoons of this jam whipped into cream, turned out to be a stellar topping for these very chocolatey waffles.

The complete recipe can be found on Linda's blog DivaWeigh.

Happy Baking!

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