Molten Chocolate Souffles with Raspberry Sauce - Recipes from Mom's 49th

This recipe didn't actually get made until the morning after Mom's party. Derek was right, I got a little too ambitious with the appetizer menu and by the time I was up for desert I was ready to be done cooking. Thank goodness I had made some Rum Vanilla cupcakes earlier in the day to serve to the guests. I'll post those eventually. In the mean time...

Molten Chocolate Souffles with Raspberry Sauce
- The original recipe for this called for milk chocolate. OF COURSE I had to change it to dark chocolate. This may have effected the way they came out. The original recipe was "Molten Chocolate Cakes" that were to be inverted beautifully onto pristine desert plates and be lovely and photographed. My "inverting" technique left something to be desired when I did a trial run on these cakes earlier in the week. I ended up with a goopy chocolate mess, which I proceded to eat with my fingers because it was still good. So what does an aspiring chef do when they failed the recipe? Work endlessly until they have mastered the invertion of this particular chocolate cake? 
Hell no. 
You change the name of the recipe to souffle and serve them in the ramekins they baked in. Presto! I'm a french baker! 

Yields 6 small souffles

12 oz semisweet chocolate, chopped, divided. (I used a 12 oz bag of dark chocolate chips)
2 Tablespoons heavy cream
1/2 cup sugar, plus 2 Tablespoons for dusting ramekins
1 cup butter, cubed, plus 2 Tablespoons for ramekins
4 eggs
4 egg yolks
2 Tablespoons flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon almond extract (tastes awesome!)

Sauce and Garnish:
1 pint fresh raspberries
1/2 cup sugar
1 Tablespoon Cointreau or other orange liquer, optional


Note - you can prepare the cakes in ramekins and refrigerate them a couple of hours until your ready to bake or you can bake them right away.


For the ganache (melted center):
Melt 4 oz of chocolate (if using chips, I hand measured a third of the bag) with heavy cream over a double boiler (my method - glass bowl over boiling water in pot). Stir until smooth and chill until firm enough to scoop - about 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Butter the ramekins and coat the inside with extra 2 Tablespoons sugar, tapping out the rest.

In a medium bowl, combine the remaining chocolate with chopped butter over another double boiler until melted, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and cool to room temp.

In a large bowl, beat together the eggs, egg yolks, and remaining 1/2 cup sugar until pale, thick and light. Sift the flour over the egg mixture and fold in the salt and almond extract. Fold in the cooled chocolate/butter mixture until uniformly combined - will take a couple minutes of folding. Divide equally between the prepared ramekins. Using a small scoop or tablespoon, form the cooled ganache into 8 balls. Put 1 ganache ball into the center of each ramekin and press down slightly until covered with batter.

**Cakes can be refrigerated at this point until ready to bake.

Bake at 400 degrees for 10-12 min. Remove and serve in ramekins by spooning raspberry sauce over top and garnishing with a couple raspberries.

Raspberry Sauce:
Reserve some berries for garnish. Throw the berries and sugar (and liqueur if using) into a sauce pan on low heat and simmer until some of the liquid is evaporated. When sauce is thick to your liking, remove from heat and cool to room temp. You can either serve the sauce with seeds or feed it through a strainer. IF you reduced the sauce too much, just add a little water until the consistency is to your liking. Use remaining sauce from the cakes on pancakes the next morning.