Se ti piace il caffè – Panna cotta al caffè con salsina al cioccolato

This panna cotta recipe has been inspired from this wonderful Italian blog called Giallo Zafferano – It’s filled with delicious and inventive recipes that are mouth-watering. For coffee lovers, this panna cotta will be a real treat. This type of dessert is called “dolce al cucchiaio” meaning spoon dessert, basically a dessert that can be eaten with a spoon.

Panna cotta is a very easy to make dessert, and you don’t need to be a master chef to succeed at it. You just need right quantities of cream, sugar and gelatine sheets…but no specific technique is required, so don’t wait, make one…at least to treat yourself (I always do!). You need strong espresso, or coffee made in a moka machine (those manual Italian coffee makers), I see a lot of those sold in the US, and they’re mainly from the brand Bialetti. So I would say that the trickiest part is to get the right coffee, otherwise your panna cotta will be somehow flavorless.

For the gelatin sheets, you can use gelatin powder as well, so 8 g of gelatin sheets would be about one packet of powder.


Ingredients for 5-6 mini cups

  • 5.3 oz (or 150 ml) strong espresso + 2.82 oz (or 80 g) for the chocolate sauce
  • 0.28 oz (or 8g) gelatin sheets or 1 pack of gelatin powder
  • 1 lb (or 500 ml) heavy cream
  • 1 vanilla bean, cut lengthwise, beans scraped
  • 1/2 tsp coffee extract (optional)
  • 3.5 oz (or 100 g) sugar
  • 3.5 oz (or 100 g) semi sweet chocolate

Preparation

Start getting your coffee ready. Soak gelatin sheets in water until they become soft. Bring cream to a boil with sugar and vanilla beans. Remove from heat and add gelatin sheets, mix well then add coffee. Strain mixture in a strainer to remove the small particles. Pour in individual molds. Let them cool, then refrigerate for about 4-5 hours.

Melt chocolate in microwave or in a water bath, add coffee and mix well to obtain a smooth texture but not too liquid.

Remove the panna cotta from molds using a small knife it it sticks to the sides of the mold. You can also place bottom of panna cotta in hot water for a few seconds to help with the removal.

Place in a plate and decorate with chocolate sauce.