Peanut Butter Chocolate Fondant

“This is a lovely dessert for Valentines Day. Chocolate fondant is a rich dessert, even more so with the addition of peanut butter! So I have paired it with cardamom vanilla cashew cream which balances out the richness perfectly.”

Prep time - 20 minutes

Cook time - 15-20 minutes

Difficulty - Medium

Serves / makes - 4

Ingredients

For the fondant -

150g dark cooking chocolate, melted

100g coconut oil or margarine, melted

100g banana

3T plant milk

100g caster sugar

3T rice flour (or plain gluten flour)

2t baking powder

2t ground cinnamon

4T smooth runny peanut butter*

A little coconut oil and cocoa powder to dust mould and pudding **

For the cream -

100g cashews, soaked in hot water for 30 minutes

6-8T plant milk

1/2t vanilla paste (or vanilla essence)

1/2t ground cardamom (optional)

1T syrup, I used agave

Equipment

Saucepan

Jug or bowl for melting chocolate

Muffin tin with at least 4 holes

Large mixing bowl

Mixing spoon

Handblender

Method

Heat your oven to 180c/360f/GM4.
Melt the chocolate and oil, either in a bowl in a saucepan with water or in a microwave.
Put the banana and milk in a bowl. Blend with a hand blender until all of the lumps are gone. Add the sugar, flour, baking powder, cinnamon, chocolate and oil. Mix well.
Pour half of the batter into 4 holes of a muffin tin**. Add 1 tablespoon of peanut butter to each, then top with the remaining batter.
Bake for around 15 minutes until the outer edges and top of the cakes are cooked but they are still gooey in the centre.
To make the cream blend the cashews, plant milk, vanilla paste, ground cardamom and syrup. Blend until the cream is completely smooth. You need to add just enough plant milk to enable the blender to move the cream around but not too much for it to be too thin.
Once the fondant has cooked, remove them from the oven and allow them to rest for 2-3 minutes. Remove them from the tin by running a knife around the edges. Put a chopping board on top of the tin then flip the board and tin over. Carefully lift the tin off the fondant.
Serve the fondant with the cream immediately. Note that if they are left too long the gooey inside may set.

Notes

*The peanut butter used in this recipe must be runny. If it is too thick it will be even thicker once cooked in the fondant. You can thin peanut butter by adding small amounts of oil to it.
**You can oil the pan and then dust it with cocoa powder if you want to. This will make it slightly easier to remove the cakes from the tin.
In this recipe I use unrefined coconut oil. I typically use refined coconut oil in a baking recipe, refined coconut oil has no coconut flavour or odour. However, in this recipe I want the coconut flavour as it pairs so well with chocolate, banana, cinnamon and cardamom.