Dentelle Croustillante
The name means “lacy cookie,” but it only partly describes these chocolate wafers, which are filled with pistachio cram and served in a sea of chocolate sauce.
Ingredients
- Chocolate Cookies
- Granulated Sugar - 1/2 cup
- Brown Sugar - 1/2 cup, firmly packed
- Unsweetened Cocoa Powder - 1 cup
- Unsalted Butter - 6 tablespoons, at room temperature
- All-Purpose Flour - 1 cup plus 1-1/2 tablespoons unbleached
- Orange Juice - 1/2 cup fresh
- Dark Rum - 2 tablespoons
- Pistachio Cram
- Heavy (whipping) cream - 2 cups
- Confectioner’s Sugar - 1 tablespoon, sifted
- Pistachio paste - 3 rounded, tablespoon
- Garnish
- Chocolate Ganache - 1/2 cup (alt. 3 ounces melted semi-sweet chocolate)
- Strawberries - 6, whole, fresh, hulled
- Confectioner’s Sugar - sifted, for dusting
- Pistachio Nuts - 3 tablespoons, chopped
- Mint Leaves - 18 fresh, cut into shreds
- Fresh Strawberries - 12, cut into fans (alt.1/2 pint fresh raspberries)
- Mint sprigs - 6 fresh
Instructions
To make the chocolate cookies: Preheat the oven to 375 F. In a large bowl, combine the granulated and brown sugars. Add the cocoa and butter and beat together vigorously with a wooden spoon for 1 to 2 minutes. Add the 1 cup flour and stir in. The batter will be stiff. Add the orange juice and rum and mix until smooth.
Dust a baking sheet with the remaining flour. Alternating dollops of batter so that 12 will fit on the pan with at least three inches of space between them, spoon about 2 tablespoons of batter per dollop onto the pan. Using a rubber spatula, spread each dollop out to a 3-1/2–inch circle. Bake for 10 minutes. Let cool completely, then cut a circle out of each with a 3-inch ring mold or cookie cutter.
To make the pistachio cream: In a deep bowl, whip the cream until foamy. Add the sugar and continue beating until soft peaks begin to form. Add the pistachio paste and beat for 1 or 2 minutes, until stiff peaks form. Transfer the cream to a pastry bag fitted with a 1/2-inch star tip. Refrigerate.
To serve: Spoon chocolate ganache (or melted chocolate) in the center of each dessert plates and anchor a chocolate cookie in it. Pipe rosettes of pistachio cream over the cookie. Top with another cookie and pipe cream around the perimeter. Put a whole strawberry, tip up, in the center of each. Dust the plates with confectioner’s sugar. Sprinkle pistachios and shredded mint around the plates. Garnish each plate with two fanned strawberries or fresh raspberries and a mint sprig.
