Cinnamon Chocolate Pudding with Maple Coconut Cream

Seeing as I’ve been eating this big ol’ salad for three days straight now, it’s time to go back to chocolate! YAY.

I made you these little chocolate pudding cups with dollops of coconut whipped cream sweetened with a just a bit of maple syrup. I also simplified America’s pudding making technique. Or is it the entire Western world? Oh dear… but hey, my way is so much easier and the results are identical.

You put all the ingredients, minus the chopped chocolate, into one pot and whisk continuously as you bring the mixture to an almost-boil, then simply strain it through a fine mesh strainer over the chopped chocolate and whisk again until the chocolate is fully melted and combined. Cover it tightly, refrigerate overnight, and come back in the morning for breakfast. Pudding is obviously breakfast.

There are a few variations you can play with. You can either use 3 egg yolks or 2 whole eggs. I’m torn between which I prefer. Whole eggs give the pudding more body, whereas egg yolks alone make a sleeker pudding. I sound like I’m talking about shampoo, but I don’t know how else to describe it! Truth be told, most of the time I just use whatever I have on hand. I happened to have 3 egg yolks. In fact, my need to get rid of 3 egg yolks is what inspired this post in the first place, so that’s what I used. Most of the time I use 2 whole eggs because I simply cannot be bothered. Figuring out what to do with the other half of the egg is such botheration, amiright?

You can also use regular whipped cream, but coconut and chocolate! HELLO.

Along the same lines, you can use regular sugar instead of maple syrup, but again, HELLO. Raw honey, however, I would be in support of.

I highly recommend cinnamon and the darkest dark chocolate, but you can opt for only-kinda-dark chocolate. Milk chocolate is simply a travesty.