I have a good friend here in Mallorca whose grown-up kids live in Scotland, and he was always raving about the caramel sauce they put on puddings in Scotland..... so for his birthday, I decided to try to make a bottle for him. It was a big success, he loved it :) I used this recipe, but this one also looks interesting.....
My favourite cakes have lots of fruit in them, like my apple cake, my pear frangipane, but this friend likes "just plain chocolate cake" so another time he and his wife invited us to dinner, I made this one - really easy, and also a big hit :)
Which got me thinking.... if he loves caramel, and chocolate - surely he would love Rolo puddings!
I love Rolo puddings! But it's one of the few things from the UK that I like, that I haven't been able to find here in Mallorca. So I decided to try and make a homemade version. Now whenever I ask him what he wants for dessert, this is what he asks for! It's really delicious, looks impressive, but is super quick and easy to make :)
Ingredients (serves 6 - it's very rich, so I make them in tiny little glasses)
For the toffee layer
2 cups / 450 ml milk
1/4 cup (or less) cornflour
1/2 cup sugar (white or brown, whichever you have/prefer - I tried it once with panela but I think golden granulated sugar works better)
1/4 cup / 60 g butter
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
A sprinkling of salt
1) Have all your ingredients ready prepared/measured out and to hand, and your little glasses ready to fill.
2) Mix together the milk and cornflour, and set aside.
3) Put the sugar in a small saucepan and moisten with a little (about a dessertspoon) water. Stir and heat slowly to dissolve the sugar, and when it starts to boil and bubble, stop stirring and just watch it carefully...... when it turns a nice dark brown colour (probably a bit browner than you think it should be) and smells nicely caramel-like, add the butter and then the milk/cornflour mix and stir and heat until the butter dissolves and the mixture thickens to the texture of double cream. You will see that it is much paler now - that's why you need to make the caramel really brown. Add the vanilla essence and stir through.
4) Immediately pour into your little glasses and sprinkle with a tiny bit of salt
Now you can wash up your little saucepan, and prepare your ingredients ready to make the chocolate layer.
For the chocolate layer
25g / 1/4 cup cocoa
25g dark (70%) chocolate
Less than 1 tbsp cornflour
50g / 1/4 cup white sugar (sugar is twice as heavy as cocoa)
15g butter
1 cup milk
5) Put all ingredients into a small saucepan, stir and heat gently until it thickens to the texture of double cream.
6) Immediately pour on top of the toffee layer.
7) When it's cooled a little bit, pop in the fridge until you want to serve.
