MOIST CHOCOLATE CAKE WITH RED BEANS AND SALTED CARAMEL CREAM

(for 4 people)

INGREDIENTS FOR THE CAKE

  • 280 g Amio Red Beans
  • 250 g American sweet potatoes
  • 2 tablespoons flax meal (grind 1 tablespoon seeds or buy it ready-made) + 4 tablespoons water
  • 4 tablespoons of bitter cocoa powder
  • 75 g dark chocolate 80%
  • 4 tablespoons coconut oil
  • 3 tablespoons of honey
  • 1 tablespoon Rhum

INGREDIENTS FOR THE CARAMEL SAUCE

  • 150 g sugar
  • 20 ml water
  • 120 ml fresh cream
  • 1/2 teaspoon pink Himalayan salt

PROCEDURE

  1. Soak the dried beans in water the night before preparation; about 10-12 hours of soaking is needed. Then rinse them, put them in a pot with 1 1/2 liters of cold water (about 500 ml per 100g of product) and bring to a boil. Cook on low heat and with the lid on for about 1 hour (if using a pressure cooker, the time is halved).
  2. Drain the beans from the cooking water and keep them aside.
  3. Meanwhile, peel and wash the potatoes and cut them into medium-sized cubes.
  4. Steam the papayas for about 20 minutes until soft. Remove from steamer and allow to cool.
  5. Preheat the oven to 180 C° and take the butter out of the refrigerator.
  6. Place the flax meal back into a bowl and dilute it with 4 tablespoons of water, mix well and let it sit for 5-10 minutes until it turns into a gel.
  7. Blend the cooked beans until a moist flour is obtained.
  8. Add the potato chunks to the bean mixture in the blender and blend everything together.
  9. Add the gel obtained from the flax meal, the coconut oil (if it is solid, it should be melted quickly in a small saucepan or water bath) and the honey. Blend everything until a moist mixture is obtained.
  10. Separately, melt the chopped chocolate in a bain-marie or microwave and add it to the mixture in the blender along with the 4 tablespoons of cocoa and the Rhum. Blend everything to obtain a smooth mousse that is not too runny.
  11. Grease the mold with a little butter or coconut oil and line with baking paper, then pour in the dough.
  12. Bake in the oven for 25 minutes at 180 °C and let cool.
  13. In a saucepan, proceed with the caramel sauce by placing the sugar back in with the water. Cook over medium low heat, without stirring until the sugar is completely dissolved and slightly brownish.
  14. Meanwhile, in a separate saucepan, heat the cream without boiling it.
  15. Pour the cream trickling into the caramel, stirring continuously until perfectly blended, and bring to a boil, cooking the sauce for another 2 to 3 minutes.
  16. Turn off the heat and add the room-temperature butter, stirring with a whisk until it melts completely; add the salt.
  17. Remove the cake from the mold and sprinkle with the caramel sauce.

The thin glass panes of the window vibrate with each gust of wind, shaken like tree tops weighed down by water. The eye lingers among those branches, then loses itself far away to the line of the sea, which can barely be seen among the passing fast clouds.

It is like a dance, the rain. Light, it twirls gracefully and then unleashes itself with the energy of a fury.
I lean my fingers against the cold glass, slightly misted by my breath savoring for the first time in months, a moment of stillness. Rain always comforts me; it brings with it a sweet sensation of slowness, the same feeling one gets from carefully savoring something truly delicious. It happens sometimes that ideas arise by pure chance, coincidences, moments, sudden inspirations, strange things, silly things. I turn my gaze from the gusts of rain beating on the window to a faint glint coming from a dim corner in the kitchen. An English dessert fork, in blackened silver, – among other forks all too common and left there for years to be too pretentious, – calls to my memory scattered images.

Black skies over London, Victorian splendor, banquets and embroidered tablecloths, goblets of sweet wine … libidinous cakes that the Anglo-Saxon world would call decadent.

I don’t have a lot of ingredients on hand, mostly poor ingredients like sweet potatoes and red beans-which I love so much during the winter-and my stash of fondende chocolate, which is never missing from the wooden shelves of my cupboard.