Delice au Chocolat et aux Bananes: Chocolate and Banana Flan

Today I decided to make a French dessert, one meant for tomorrow's all-French dinner that I am cooking for some of my good friends here in York. What is a flan? Simply put, it is a more high-class version of custard, soft yet not oozy, with a base of...anything, really. I have seen recipes for Asparagus flan, but I do not want to go there. No.

This is actually not a difficult dessert to make--and it's oh so sinfully good. It looks like a cake, but sink your teeth into it and meet no resistance at all as it embraces your mouth from the inside, and clings on to it in sticky, chocolatey goodness.

For dark chocolate lovers, this is one of those dishes-that-will-send-you-into-paradise that you seem to have an inordinately large share of. Although in my case I don't actually like dark chocolate instinctively--I don't really find the bitterness of it palatable (I hear your cries of 'blasphemy!', and I am ignoring them)--I have found myself liking it more with each successive slice I eat.

In future I will use milk chocolate, though...or just add more sugar to the ensemble.

Here's how to make this Delice, which is enough to fill a 12 by 7.5 inch baking tray nicely. This dish took me about an hour to finish, from preparation to completion. Cooling it, however, will take another half an hour or so, ideally, so that the Delice can solidify and be handled as a slice instead of having bananas fall off when you try to pick up a slice. But if you can't stand the temptation and want to eat it already, well, it tastes as good warm as it does cold!


Ingredients
(note: 1 ounce = 28.34 grams, 1 cup = 250ml)

7 ounces semi-sweet or 70% dark chocolate (I had to use 86% because that's all they had)
3 eggs, beaten
2/3 cup creme fraiche (or double cream)
1/2 cup whole milk
3 long bananas
1 small bottlecap-full of rum (optional: I used Bacardi)
Icing sugar for decoration

For lining the baking tray:
1 tbsp butter (not a heaped tablespoon) at room temperature
Sugar

Instructions

1) Preheat the oven to 175 degrees Celsius (that's nearly 350 degrees Fahrenheit, if you need to know).

2) Chop, or break, the chocolate up into small pieces, and put them into a mixing bowl. They don't have to be toooo small. Just...little chunks.

3) Put the cream and milk into a saucepan and heat it up until it simmers and begins bubbling slightly. Don't allow it to boil.

TIP: To prevent milk from sticking to the pot or burning, either drop in a tablespoonful of water into the pot with the milk, or simply wash the pot in cold water, and pour the milk in without drying it first.

4) Pour the hot cream-and-milk over the chocolate chunks in the bowl, and stir the mixture around as the chocolate melts, until the batter is smooth.

5) While letting the batter cool, beat 3 eggs, then add them to the batter and mix well with a whisk for best effect.

6) Using your room-temperature butter, coat the bottom and sides of the baking tray you are using, then sprinkle a liberal layer of sugar over it.

7) Slice the bananas into slices about half a centimetre thick or more, and line the bottom of the baking tray with them to form a base.

8) Pour the chocolate batter into the dish over the bananas, then place it into the preheated oven and bake it for 15-25 minutes, depending on how hard or unresisting you want the final Delice to be. I baked mine midway, for about 20 minutes.

9) When time is up, remove the flan from the oven, sprinkle its top with rum (I splattered it, rather than sprinkled it, though) and some icing sugar, then put it back in the oven to bake. Place it right under the grill if possible, and bake at the same temperature for another 3-5 minutes.

10) Take the flan out of the oven, and let it cool. Snow the flan under with icing sugar for visual effect, then serve it up, or slice it up and enjoy! :) Serve it with a sauce dribbled over it to counteract the bitterness of the chocolate, if you're one with a sweet tooth. Otherwise, just eat it as it is!

TIP: According to the recipe I found online, it is also possible to bake the flan in advance up to step 8, then refrigerate until you need to serve it up, upon which you continue with steps 9 and 10. I haven't tried this yet.


Hope you liked this dish! More to come, maybe even tomorrow. :) Stay tuned!