Everybody’s got a dark side
My close friends know mine by now
I am a big of fan dark twisted series and movies.
Two years ago, a dark side of me emerged, and it craved searching for and watching old psychological horrors: Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, Repulsion, The Innocents, and of course, Psycho!
Now, I am hooked on creepy series. Only when it got cancelled did I realize that the only non-creepy series I was following was Glee.
I began watching creepy series a few years ago, starting with American Horror Story, which I had to watch its first season twice before I was able to get to the end of it. That season reminds me of a relevant story I’d rather keep to myself now.
From there, I started searching for interesting series to watch and I ended up with a bunch of chilling ones.
- Salem, about the witch trials and the Puritans
- American Horror Story. And that haunting French song from season 2
- Bates Motel. The eerie early relationship between Norman and his mother before Psycho
- and Hannibal. The relationship between Dr. Hannibal Lecter and his first murders with his colleague and patient Will Graham.
I am mesmerized by the beauty of Hannibal. It is a series about a cannibal who cooks his victims for pleasure and eats them. I am stunned every time a dish is made and presented; the idea, the cuisine, the styling, and the whole concept of cannibalism. If only I eat offals, I would have tried replicating the recipes, with animal parts to be clear.
I recently discovered the blog of the food stylist who prepares all the food made on set, Janice Poon from Cooking Hannibal. It is interesting to see and read the things she has to go through in order to get the dish in front of the camera.
During the last part of season 3, Hannibal made a dessert, Sanguinaccio Dolce, that I knew I need to make it as soon as possible. It is made from chocolate cooked in milk and pig’s blood. Hannibal made it with almond’s milk because it’s easier on the stomach and used cow’s blood instead of pig’s. The heated blood coagulates and thickens the mixture making each spoon a creamy mouthful with a coppery metallic flavor.
Knowing me, I won’t be cooking with any type of blood for the time being. So I had to make up for the gelling agent by using the cornflour trick. The original recipes call for sugar to balance the bitterness of the chocolate and the saltiness of blood. But I chose my ingredients to balance the flavor without any sugar. Replacing milk with almond milk will turn this dessert into a bloody vegan dessert. Blood. I forgot that I replaced blood with a juicy pale red orange liquid from a blood orange.
Makes 3-4 servings
Ingredients
- 1 cup milk (or vegan milk alternative)
- 200g dark chocolate (50% is fine)
- Sprinkle of salt
- Dash of cinnamon
- 1/4 cup blood orange juice (from 1 orange, preserving the skin)
- 1 1/2 tbsp corn flour
Procedure
- In a heavy saucepan, warm the milk, chocolate, salt, and cinnamon stirring until smooth
- Cut the orange in half, and with a spoon, go into the white pith, between the flesh and skin, and separate it keeping the skin as intact as possible. Wash it and leave it to dry if necessary
- Squeeze the flesh of the orange and strain
- Whisk the corn flour into the blood orange juice and pour into the milk chocolate mixture. Whisk continuously until it starts to thicken
- Remove from heat and let cool for 5 minutes before scooping into prepared orange skin
- Garnish with mint leaves, berries, or as Hannibal served it, with cinnamon stick and ladies fingers
P.S. This time, I went from unedited to full-blown heavily filtered edited photos. I needed a certain feel to accompany the recipe. What do you think?
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