Almost 9 years ago on Valentine's Day, I was on bed rest and we were waiting the birth of our lovely little girl. While the doctor had given me kitchen privileges to go grab something, I couldn't stand and cook a lovely dinner for us. Nor could I go out to a restaurant and share a special meal together with my love. My sister-in-law were taking care of our son during the day, since I couldn't be up and on my feet.
Undaunted by our challenges, my husband went to the Whole Foods near his office and ordered a Valentine's Meal for us. Next he picked up flowers, a movie and our son from my brother's house and headed for home. There was salmon, a salad of wild greens, asparagus and a decadent chocolate dessert. For our son there were chicken tenders, carrots, potatoes and a little vanilla ice cream. After dinner we watched the movie and delighted in being together. It was a wonderful Valentine's Day, being together with the ones I love while we waited for our little one to come. Our tiny strawberry haired girl arrived five weeks later, just in time for our anniversary.
Since that time, we celebrate Valentine's Day at home. We select a menu from a local restaurant or Whole Foods and bring our meal home. Sometimes, I make our dessert and other times we buy something rich and full of chocolate from a local pastry shop. As the kids have gotten older, they have been put in charge of our activities while my husband and I take care of dinner.
For my loved ones this year, I wanted to share with them a dessert my mother made when I was younger. It was a recipe was from her friend Evelyn for a sweet concoction called Fudge Pie, that she served either with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream. It was an intensely sweet dessert that I wanted adapt to be less sugary and tweak to be gluten free. For a special touch, I used mini cookie cutters to cut out hearts for my loved ones.Everyone loved the little hearts and were delighted that the dessert wasn't as sweet as the first ones I made. My husband and I enjoyed our little hearts plain, but our children had them adorning a small bowl of vanilla ice cream. They were a heavenly little bite of chocolate to round off a wonderful meal.
I'm also submitting this recipe to the A Heart for Your Valentine event hosted by Zorra at 1x Umruhren Bitte.
Recipe
2 ounces semi sweet chocolate
6 Tb butter
2 eggs, beaten
2/3 cup cane sugar
1 Tb arrowroot starch
1 Tb sweet rice flour
2 Tb brown rice flour
1 1/2 tsp chia seed meal
pinch sea salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
1. Line an 8 x 8 cake pan with parchment paper and preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. In a medium sauce pan, drop in the butter and chocolate. Melt together on low heat, stirring to make sure the chocolate doesn't stick to the bottom of the pan.
3. Once melted together, dump in the sugar and stir. Stir for a few minutes until the chocolate is incorporated. Remove from the heat.
4. In a small bowl, plop in the flours, chia seed meal and the salt. Stir together.
5. Sprinkle the flour mixture over the top of the melted chocolate and stir together.
6. Add the egg to the sauce pan and stir until incorporated.
7. Pour the mixture into the cake pan and bake for 15 to 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and cool before serving.
