Despite being more commonly used in sweet applications, chocolate has been used as an ingredient in savory cooking for over a thousand years. In Europe, chocolate has been used extensively in Italian cuisine since being introduced to Europe, including in lasagna and fried liver. While savory chocolate is today most famously used in mole, it is still an ingredient in some European recipes and used by some chefs.
Macreuse en ragout au chocolat
Having properly plucked and cleaned your wigeon, empty and clean it; blanch it on the fire and then pot it, seasoning it with salt, pepper, bay, and a bundle of herbs. Make a little chocolate to toss it in. Meanwhile, prepare a ragout with the liver, mushrooms, morels, meadow mushrooms, truffles, a quarter of a pound of chestnuts, and your wigeon now cooked and laid out on a platter. Serve your ragout over the wigeon, and garnish it as you like.
Inscriptions on a Petén bowl from 400 CE contain a reference to chocolate, referring either to a Mayan mole or a chocolate-flavored tamale. If the former, as of 2024 this would constitute the first known reference to mole. [2] The Aztecs did not use chocolate to flavor cooking; historians Michael and Sophie Coe analogize such use to Christians making coq au vin using sacramental wine. This is despite the dish mole poblano being commonly attributed to the Aztecs. [3] In a popular legend, the use of chocolate in mole is attributed to Mexican nuns in late 17th century Puebla. [4]
Chocolate was considered a pleasant and unremarkable addition to European cuisine as of the mid-17th century. [5] The first appearance in a French recipe is 1691, where it was used in a dish of wigeon (a species of duck). In the recipe, it was not explained how chocolate was made as it was assumed the audience was familiar. [5] During the 17th century, chocolate was a common ingredient in European cooking, particularly in Northern Italy. 18th-century Italian recipes contain chocolate as an ingredient in recipes for pappardelle, fried liver, black polenta and a 1786 manuscript from Macerata records a lasagna sauce containing chocolate, alongside anchovies, walnuts and almonds. [1] [3]
While chocolate is commonly understood as only being appropriate for sweet applications, [6] chocolate is used as an ingredient in several popular recipes and by contemporary chefs. The most popular use of chocolate in savory cooking is in mole. [7] [8] Chocolate is generally used in small quantities to emulsify or, as used by Auguste Escoffier, to give dishes "some silkiness". [9] The small amount added is often emphasized by mole aficionados and recipe writers to try to prevent mole being known as chocolate sauce. [10] Chocolate is paired with venison and wild boar in Tuscany, including in the sweet-and-sour sauce agrodolce. [11] In Italy more broadly, chocolate is stirred into stews and braises to thicken and add flavor. [12] In Italy and Spain, chocolate is sometimes added to coq au vin. [7] In western recipes, chocolate has historically often been added to wine sauces, such as the grand veneur . [13] In the United States, a small amount of unsweetened chocolate is added by some cooks to chili con carne to add "richness, deeper flavor, and umami." [14]
Contemporary chefs have used chocolate in various forms, including white and dark chocolate, as well as using cacao nibs. [8] White chocolate has been used as an ingredient in savory cooking to add gloss and creaminess to sauces, counterbalance saltiness, and bring "richness" to vegetarian dishes. [15] Contemporary chefs using dark chocolate often pair it with savory winter vegetables, such as parsnips and wild mushrooms. Food scientists in the past have advocated pairing chocolate with caviar, roasted cauliflower, and with both garlic and coffee due to shared flavor molecules, [7] but this is no longer regarded as a reliable method for assessing if foods taste good together. [16]
French cuisine is the cooking traditions and practices from France. In the 14th century, Guillaume Tirel, a court chef known as "Taillevent", wrote Le Viandier, one of the earliest recipe collections of medieval France. In the 17th century, chefs François Pierre La Varenne and Marie-Antoine Carême spearheaded movements that shifted French cooking away from its foreign influences and developed France's own indigenous style.
Mexican cuisine consists of the cooking cuisines and traditions of the modern country of Mexico. Its earliest roots lie in Mesoamerican cuisine. Mexican cuisine ingredients and methods begin with the first agricultural communities such as the Olmec and Maya who domesticated maize, created the standard process of nixtamalization, and established their foodways. Successive waves of other Mesoamerican groups brought with them their cooking methods. These included: the Teotihuacanos, Toltec, Huastec, Zapotec, Mixtec, Otomi, Purépecha, Totonac, Mazatec, Mazahua, and Nahua. With the Mexica formation of the multi-ethnic Triple Alliance, culinary foodways became infused.
Sweetbread is a culinary name for the thymus or pancreas, typically from calf or lamb. Sweetbreads have a rich, slightly gamey flavor and a tender, succulent texture. They are often served as an appetizer or a main course and can be accompanied by a variety of sauces and side dishes. The etymology of the name is unclear.
Tomato sauce can refer to many different sauces made primarily from tomatoes, usually to be served as part of a dish, rather than as a condiment. Tomato sauces are common for meat and vegetables, but they are perhaps best known as bases for sauces for Mexican salsas and Italian pasta dishes. Tomatoes have a rich flavor, high water content, soft flesh which breaks down easily, and the right composition to thicken into a sauce when stewed, without the need for thickeners such as roux or masa. All of these qualities make them ideal for simple and appealing sauces.
In cooking, a sauce is a liquid, cream, or semi-solid food, served on or used in preparing other foods. Most sauces are not normally consumed by themselves; they add flavor, texture, and visual appeal to a dish. Sauce is a French word probably from the post-classical Latin salsa, derived from the classical salsus 'salted'. Possibly the oldest recorded European sauce is garum, the fish sauce used by the Ancient Romans, while doubanjiang, the Chinese soy bean paste is mentioned in Rites of Zhou 20.
A mirepoix is a mixture of diced vegetables cooked with fat for a long time on low heat without coloring or browning. The ingredients are not sautéed or otherwise hard-cooked, because the intention is to sweeten rather than caramelize them. Mirepoix is a long-standing part of French cuisine and is the flavor base for a wide variety of dishes, including stocks, soups, stews, and sauces.
A profiterole, chou à la crème, also known alternatively as a cream puff (US), is a filled French choux pastry ball with a typically sweet and moist filling of whipped cream, custard, pastry cream, or ice cream. The puffs may be embellished or left plain or garnished with chocolate sauce, caramel, or a dusting of powdered sugar.
A velouté sauce is a savory sauce that is made from a roux and a light stock. It is one of the "mother sauces" of French cuisine listed by chef Auguste Escoffier in the early twentieth century. Velouté is French for 'velvety'.
Ragout is a stew served as a main dish.
Sofrito, sofregit, soffritto, or refogado is a basic preparation in Mediterranean, Latin American, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese cooking. It typically consists of aromatic ingredients cut into small pieces and sautéed or braised in cooking oil for a long period of time over a low heat.
Mole, meaning 'sauce', is a traditional sauce and marinade originally used in Mexican cuisine. In contemporary Mexico the term is used for a number of sauces, some quite dissimilar, including mole amarillo or amarillito, mole chichilo, mole colorado or coloradito, mole manchamantel or manchamanteles, mole negro, mole rojo, mole verde, mole poblano, mole almendrado, mole michoacano, mole prieto, mole ranchero, mole tamaulipeco, mole xiqueno, pipián, mole rosa, mole blanco, mole estofado, tezmole, clemole, mole de olla, chimole, guacamole and huaxmole.
Bolognese sauce, known in Italian as ragù alla bolognese or ragù bolognese, is a meat-based sauce in Italian cuisine, typical of the city of Bologna. It is customarily used to dress tagliatelle al ragù and to prepare lasagne alla bolognese.
Oaxacan cuisine is a regional cuisine of Mexico, centered on the city of Oaxaca, the capital of the eponymous state located in southern Mexico. Oaxaca is one of the country's major gastronomic, historical, and gastro-historical centers whose cuisine is known internationally. Like the rest of Mexican cuisine, Oaxacan food is based on staples such as corn, beans, and chile peppers, but there is a great variety of other ingredients and food preparations due to the influence of the state's varied geography and indigenous cultures. Corn and many beans were first cultivated in Oaxaca. Well-known features of the cuisine include ingredients such as chocolate, Oaxaca cheese, mezcal, and grasshoppers (chapulines), with dishes such as tlayudas, Oaxacan-style tamales, and seven notable varieties of mole sauce. The cuisine has been praised and promoted by food experts such as Diana Kennedy and Rick Bayless and is part of the state's appeal for tourists.
Coffee sauce is a culinary sauce that includes coffee in its preparation. It is sometimes prepared using instant coffee. Coffee sauce has been used in American cuisine since at least 1904. Coffee sauce may be sweet or savory.
Oyster sauce describes a number of sauces made by cooking oysters. The most common in modern use is a viscous dark brown condiment made from oyster extracts, sugar, salt and water, thickened with corn starch.
Chestnut pie is a pie prepared with chestnuts as a primary ingredient. It is a part of the French cuisine and Italian cuisine, where it has been documented as dating back to the 15th century. It is also a part of the cuisine of the Southern United States. Shelled whole or chopped chestnuts may be used, which may be boiled or roasted. A chestnut purée may also be used. It may be prepared as a savory or sweet pie.
Garlic sauce is a sauce prepared using garlic as a primary ingredient. It is typically a pungent sauce, with the depth of garlic flavor determined by the amount of garlic used. The garlic is typically crushed or finely diced. Simple garlic sauce is composed of garlic and another ingredient to suspend it via emulsion, such as oil, butter or mayonnaise. Various additional ingredients can be used to prepare the sauce.
