Gingerbread Chocolate Bites

Fiery stem ginger and sharp dark chocolate, like chili and chocolate, work well together. They both have that double punch of sharp flavour.

175g plain flour
Small ground black pepper
Half a tsp nutmeg
Half tsp cinnamon
2 tsps ground ginger
Half tsp bicarbonate soda
Half tsp baking powder
100g butter
5 tbsp Demerara sugar
4 tbsp Golden Syrup
60g crystallised stem ginger
100g milk chocolate
100g 70% cocoa dark chocolate

Sieve the flour, pepper, nutmeg, cinnamon, ground ginger, baking soda and powder into a large mixing bowl and set aside.

Whiz the stem ginger in a processor or with a hand held blender until a rough paste forms. (You may have to carefully peel some of the gooey paste off the blades afterwards).

Heat the butter, syrup, and sugar together over a low heat until combined and melted.

At the same time heat a small pan of water to a low simmer. Put the all the dark and about 30g of milk in a bowl over the water and gently melt until liquid.

Remove the butter syrup from the heat, once melted, and stir in the chocolate.

Allow to cool a little and stir in to the sieved flour mixture. Combine, along with the ginger paste, until a firm-ish, gooey, dough forms.

Shape it into a ball with floured hands and leave to chill in the bowl in the fridge for half hour or so.

Pre-heat the oven to 185 degrees C. Lay a sheet of baking paper on a large baking tray.

Dollop dessert spoons size balls of the mixtures along the baking sheet with an inch gap between each.

Bake in the pre-heated oven for 12 minutes. Remove from the oven, squidge down with the back of a large spoon whilst they are still warm and malleable; to form a nice disk shape.

Leave to chill for a while until they firm up. Whilst chilling heat the remainder of the milk chocolate the same way as before over a low heat. Dip each chilled bite into the hot runny chocolate, by lowering with a fork, turning, lifting out and tapping off the remaining chocolate on the side.

Lay back on a plate covered in baking paper (to catch any runny chocolate). Any that runs off onto the paper can be used to coat any bites that need that extra dollop. Chill them all in the fridge until the coating chocolate has firmed up.