Chocolate Sorbet

This week is National Chocolate Week, so it seemed to be the prefect time to post this recipe.

I can’t say firmly enough how much you have to make this sorbet, if you are at all a chocolate fan. It is chocolate in its purest form, unadulterated by cream or any other additional flavours. I’m not saying it wouldn’t be good with some orange in it, but first time round it needs to be made straight up.

I was really dubious about making chocolate sorbet. I mean, it sounds like a poor relation of chocolate ice cream. However, I had read a couple of people raving about it, and it does have a lot of chocolate in it, so I thought it couldn’t be too bad. It is also gluten and dairy-free, which is an added bonus. I don’t even have an ice-cream maker, and still believe it is more than worth the effort. I can't remember where I wrote the recipe down from, so apologies for not giving the credit.

Chocolate Sorbet

555 ml water
200g caster sugar
75g cocoa powder (yes really!)
Pinch salt
170g dark chocolate
½ tsp vanilla extract

Whisk 375 ml of water with the sugar, cocoa powder and salt. Bring to the boil, whisking frequently. Boil, while whisking, for 45 seconds.

Remove from the heat and stir in the chocolate until melted, then add the remaining water and vanilla. Leave to cool. Then either use an ice-cream machine according to the instructions, or put in a freezer-proof container and freeze. Every hour or so remove from the freezer and whisk, to ensure there are no crystals. This needs to be done three or four times.

It freezes very solid, so make sure you remove it from the freezer twenty minutes or so before you want to serve it. This was particularly good with orange shortbread biscuits.

Le Skipper, Ile de Re (France)

The view from the restaurant

For our second night we ventured a bit further afield, and went to St Martin-de-Re. We had a drink while the sun set, and then wandered about a bit looking at menus before deciding on Le Skipper. Unfortunately we were too late to nab an outside table, but the interior was very smart, with a Ralph Lauren feel.

Again we had the set menu, which was €26. I started with sashimi, which didn’t seem very French, but it did seem appropriate given that we could see the sea from where we sat. It was melt in the mouth, and came with a great coriander sauce as well as soy. R started with six oysters, which were on even the cheapest set menus as the Ile de Re is one of the main French producers. R had never eaten an oyster when we met, so I am rather proud of him now!

I then had dorade, which I think is bream. This was simply but perfectly cooked, and accompanied by a rather bland ratatouille. The fish was definitely the star at this restaurant, and all of the accompaniments were second thoughts rather. It didn’t matter though as we hugely enjoyed our fish.

To finish we had a pave au chocolat, with salt caramel (again). A lot of salt is produced on the Ile de Re, which I think is the reason salt caramel appears on so many menus (as well as in the form of ice cream – more on that later!).

The pave was absolutely fantastic, and for once we had both ordered the same thing, which is lucky or otherwise there might have been a fight! Rich creamy chocolate mousse sat on top of a wafer made of puffed rice and chocolate, with the caramel providing a wonderfully contrasting salty note.

I also need to add a quick note on the service, which was great. The staff didn't really speak any English, and I was trying to explain that I can't eat wheat in my schoolgirl French. We got there in the end, and the waitress was more than happy to check with the chef about the ingredients, and offer me an alternate if there was nothing on the set menu I could eat.