heart melters

If I told you that these chocolate bitesize beauties are practically good for you, would you think I was lying to you?

Well, worry not, I would not lie about chocolate, would I.

Last Saturday afternoon, I felt like baking & I felt like chocolate. I remembered the beautifully named chocolate full stops from one of my newest recipe books & thought that now was the perfect time to bake them. 

As I perused the pages of Red Velvet & Chocolate Heartache my eyes fell upon the recipe for an August Wedding Cake & my mind wandered to thinking through the practicalities of baking my own wedding cake. I reminded myself that now was not the time to be having such crazy thoughts, I was on a chocolate mission.

Here are a few lessons I learned along the way of my baking journey to making chocolate full stops & how they came to be known by me as heart melters.

:: adapting recipes is a fine & fun thing to do, if you know what you're doing. usually, just changing the kind of tin you bake in is perfectly acceptable. usually, but not always.

:: it really is possible to bake something chocolatey that also boasts a vegetable ingredient.

:: rather than trusting your instincts & cutting out the vegetable ingredient because it seems ever so slightly mad, trust the beautiful woman who designed these recipes & enjoy the feeling of baking rebelliously

(NB: rebellious in this context means not using any butter but using butternut squash instead. Sure, they both have 'butter' in their name, but one is most definitely not butter.)

:: don't mistake an ice cube tray from ikea for a clever silicone tray. it might just melt in the oven.

After reading my lessons for the day, if you feel like you trust me enough to try this, I would highly recommend heart melters as part of your daily diet.


choocolate heart melters

ingredients makes 24

150g peeled, diced butternut squash
50g dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids)
1 egg
60g caster sugar
20g rice flour (or plain flour if you don't have any - I used plain)
20g ground almonds
20g cocoa
2 tsp baking powder

1) Preheat the oven to 180C / Gas mark 4 / 350. Line two mini muffin trays with petit four cases. If you happen to have silicone mini muffin trays, use these - no greasing or cases required. If you don't have any of the above, just use a baking tray and line up your petit four cases (or any small kind of cake case you can find) in neat little rows.

2) Place the diced butternut squash in a saucepan & cover with water. Bring to the boil & let them bubble away for 6 mins. Drain the water and add the chocolate chunks. Stir together then leave for a couple of minutes before stirring again. The chocolate melts wonderfully from the heat of the squash.

3) Whisk the egg & sugar together in a large mixing bowl for 3 minutes. Add the flour, ground almonds, cocoa & baking powder, and whisk until everything is combined.

4) Having stirred the chocolate & butternut squash together, puree the mixture using a hand held blender, or food processor. Whisk the puree into the egg mixture until combined.

5) Using 2 teaspoons, carefully dollop small amounts of the mixture into each case, then bake in the oven for 12 minutes. (if you use larger cases, they'll probably need 15 - 20 minutes baking time.)

6) Remove from the oven & leave on a wire rack to cool. Or, if you're really desperate to see if this recipe has actually worked, eat them straight out of the oven.


Cake Count :: 703