May 3: National Chocolate Custard Day

I almost drowned the chocolate custard before it even went in the oven. And if I had, there would have been no hope of survival for that chocolate custard. Notice I said almost, as in, I did not actually drown that chocolate custard. It was a close call though.

Today taught me an important lesson: read the instructions carefully and don't skim over them.

JazzyJ's Chocolate Coffee Custard Creation:

Ingredients:
- 2 eggs
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 1 1/2 cups milk (hot hot hot)
- 2 teaspoons vanilla (or you could be exotic and use Mocha Kahlua instead like I did ;)
- 1/2 tablespoon instant coffee

Instructions:
1. Fill a 9 by 13 inch pan with water and place in the oven at 325 degrees.

Note: I thought I was going to pour the custard mixture into this hot water. I was very very wrong. The pan(s) containing the custard mixture, will be placed in this pan of hot water. The custard mixture and the hot water will do no touching.

2. Beat the eggs lightly. Add in the sugar, cocoa, salt, coffee, and vanilla (or Kahlua).
3. Add in the very hot milk slowly. (I said slowly, you don't want to cook the eggs!)
4. Pour into a quart pan or four ramikins. Place pan(s) or ramikins in the pan of hot water in the oven.

Note: What is a ramikin? It is a small ceramic bowl used for baking.
Another Note: I didn't have a quart pan or ramikins. I used three small bread loaf pans instead. It worked.

5. Bake for 60 -65 minutes, or until knife comes out clean.

Refrigerate until firm, at least two hours. 

Before baking.

Fresh out of the oven.

It had a nice, subtle coffee taste to it. And it didn't drown! It was moist and a little spongy.