On Monday at work, I got to make dessert again for the residents. I knew I would be doing this the week before, when I made the strawberry-rhubarb crumble (which was a HIT with the residents, BTW!) and I came across a 2.5kg bag of frozen strawberries languishing in the freezer. I told the cook I'd think about it for a week and come up with some way to use the berries on Monday. I turned over various ideas in my mind, but eventually came up with something simple and within budgetary requirements: chocolate strawberry shortcakes.
I made the biscuit recipe before, here, and knew it to be a reliable, good recipe, as are most that come from Canadian Living. I needed 29 desserts, not of huge size, and so I doubled the recipe and got what I needed from it.
A word about cocoa powder: not all cocoa powders are created equally! Since the organization I work for is non-profit, there is a strict ingredients budget to work around, so the priority is not high quality cocoa powder. The cocoa I used in this particular dessert was the Wally World el cheapo brand, and it has a greyish hue. Hence the biscuits are not terribly chocolatey-looking or -tasting. But they were OK for this crowd.
For the filling, I used the entire bag of strawberries, thawing them out first and slicing them in half. In a large pot, I mixed the berries, their juices, some lemon juice, nutmeg, and about 2 cups sugar. I brought the whole thing to a boil and simmered for a little while...
...When the berries had cooked down a bit, I skimmed out some of the juices and made a slurry with a few TBSP of cornstarch. After the filling had thickened, I took it off the stove to cool.
The final result - fabulous!
The staff, including bosses, were really happy, so I hope the residents are, too. I tried this one and it was really, really good.
