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“Basically what I love about chocolate is that it brings people together and is an immediate morale booster, whether it is a cup of hot chocolate on a cold night, or a pack of Lindt shared amongst friends. I love cooking with chocolate and I believe it is a versatile product whether in desserts or even in savory dishes.” That’s why Timothy Nathan Tejuco, the winner of the House of Switzerland Canada 2010 – National Chocolate Contest, loves chocolate. I love chocolate too so I was really eager to try Timothy’s award-winning recipe. It actually looked quite simple compared to the 2nd and 3rd place finishers in the contest – the simpler, the better!
However, I found his instructions deceptively simple – it assumes that you have knowledge on how to make “sabayons” and “ganaches” – which is understandable if you’re a chocolatier or baker, but not to me! I’ve modified the recipe in terms of portion size (his original one made A LOT and would’ve cost me about $40 in chocolate), and also have some comments on proportions. Unless Timothy has some secret trick to holding together rice krispies and crushed pecans with a tiny bit of chocolate, I really don’t see how his amount of chocolate for the base would work, so I’ve doubled the amount of chocolate in the base. I even tried both methods – his original proportions, and then with my doubling of the chocolate. His original proportions just didn’t hold the base together and ended up half the base flaking off. I’ve posted the original recipe in case you want to see his original.
This was a great learning experience for me, so I’ve shared my many tips (as a result of my mistakes) so I hope you find this educational and also have a great dessert in your arsenal of recipes! It turned out delicious, despite my trial and error!
Ingredients
For the base:
- 170g Pureed Toasted Pecans ~ $1.99
- 100g Lindt Excellence Extra Creamy Milk Chocolate ~ $1.76
- 100g Lindt White Chocolate ~ $1.76
- 126g Crushed Rice Crispies ~ $1.77
For the top:
- 80g Cream ~ $2.69
- 210g Lindt Excellence 70% Cacao Dark Chocolate ~ $6.98
- 80g Egg Yolks (about 3 large eggs) ~ $0.62
- 60g Icing Sugar ~ $0.10
- 50g Soft Butter ~ $1.71
- 10g Water
Instructions
For the base:
1. Melt the chocolate, stir in the pecans and the rice crispies.
Note: If you can’t find crushed toasted pecans, you can buy whole pecans and roast and crush them yourself, which is what I did. This added a good 15 minutes to my prep time. To toast, I laid out my pecans in a single layer, brushed them with oil, and baked them in the oven at 350F for 4.5 minutes on both sides. Season with salt. See the following link for the method I used.
To crush them, place the roasted pecans in a ziplock bag and close it tightly. Use a rolling pin to roll over the pecans to crush them. If you don’t have a rolling pin, like me, you can use any round glass bottle (i.e.soy sauce bottle).
To melt the chocolate, use a double boiler. You can make-shift a double boiler like I did using a metal bowl over the top of a pot of boiling water.
2. Place this on the base of a non-stick sheet pan. Chill in fridge for 1 hour.
For the top (ganache):
3. Whisk the egg yolk and sugar in a double boiler over very low heat to create a sabayon.
Note: A sabayon is a dessert sauce usually made with whipping eggs with sugar and alcohol. In this case, we are only using egg yolk and icing sugar. See the following link on more details on the technique of how to make a sabayon.
4. Melt the chocolate and combine with cream to form a ganache.
Note:This was the hardest part of the recipe. A ganache is pretty complex – pay careful attention to the temperature of the ganache and how hard you’re beating it (don’t overbeat!). See my notes in the “Quick Notes” section below on more detailed steps on how to make a ganache and how to avoid my mistakes and how I fixed them.
5. Slowly add butter and water to the mixture until fully incorporated.
6. Place the mixture on top of the base and spread evenly.
7. Chill in fridge for about 4 hours.
8. Slice into 1 inch, by 2 cm bars and serve just under room temperature! Enjoy!
Quick Notes
My first attempt at ganache was an absolute mess. Every mistake you can make – I made it! My ganache turned grainy and it separated. Luckily, the fix for both is to add a teaspoon of cold cream and stir. This helped a bit but it was still grainy and a bit oily. In the end, I just gave up and scraping off the oil and spread my grainy ganache over the base. It actually turned out well, and no one seemed to notice my grainy, separated ganache. Imagine how much BETTER it would’ve tasted if I had made it properly! I will definitely try this recipe again to perfect my ganache.
I recommend reading up on ganache techniques before attempting to make this. Making a ganache is VERY precise because it is an emulsion. Emulsifying is the process of mixing 2 ingredients that typically do not combine (i.e. a liquid and a fat) into a stable homogenous mixture. The ingredients are forced together and held in suspension through the manual or mechanical action of beating, whisking, or mixing. In a chocolate emulsion, the cocoa butter is the fat and the cream is the liquid. Thus, they are very prone to separation. The 2 most common mistakes are: (a) the improper ratio of cocoa butter to cream or too much sugar; and (b) incorrect temperature. The temperature should be, at all times during the process, above 35C, ideally between 35C to 40C. Another suggestion I read is to use an immersion blender instead of mixing. Check out Elaine’s post on L’Ephemeres Chocolate aux Poires for her tips and simple method on making ganache.
As I bake more, I find a lot of recipes use weight. I do have a scale, but it’s not very accurate. If you plan on baking a lot, I would recommend investing in a good scale – it makes for much more consistent results. I had to estimate a lot, especially with the lighter ingredients, so that may have contributed to me having to adjust the proportions as I went along, or my mess with the ganache!
Variations
The recipe calls for Lindt chocolate because it was for a Lindt chocolate recipe. I found the cost of this recipe to be quite a lot, so to save on costs, you can use baking chocolate instead. Just remember to keep it to the same mix of dark, milk and white chocolate.
Results
Despite my many mistakes with the ganache, the Crispy Pecan Chocolate Bars turned out really well! I really love the mix of roasted pecans with the rice krispies. I brought these bars to work and they were a hit, with many coming back for seconds. I think that is a true sign of what’s good. I will definitely add this to my arsenal of desserts, and it is great for taking to a party. Enjoy and thanks to Timothy Nathan Tejuco and the House of Switzerland for providing this recipe!
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