Recipe from Laura Bilodeau Overdeck
Adapted by Ligaya Mishan
Updated Jan. 31, 2024
- Total Time
- 10 minutes
- Prep Time
- 5 minutes
- Cook Time
- 5 minutes
- Rating
- 4(90)
- Notes
- Read community notes
Chocolate fondue is not a traditional dessert but a creation of the 1960s, first conjured up at Chalet Suisse, an alpine-themed restaurant in New York, by Konrad Egli, a Swiss chef and restaurateur far from home. This version is a simple equation of chocolate and heavy cream — essentially ganache, but in different proportions. Warm the cream, pour it over the chocolate and stir. A touch of salt brings the flavor into focus. You don’t need a fondue pot or even a double boiler: Just jury-rig a heatproof rack over a candle, or fill a pot or bowl with boiling water and tuck a smaller bowl inside it. (The key is not to melt the chocolate directly over flame, as this may result in scorching or a grainy, broken mixture.) Serve with whatever you think a little gilding with chocolate makes better: maybe bright crescents of clementines, candied yuzu peel, chewy stubs of mochi, butter-heavy pound cake or whole strawberries like fat little hearts. —Ligaya Mishan
Featured in: A Chocolate Fondue to Remember
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Ingredients
Yield:2 servings
- 4ounces bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
- ¼cup heavy cream
- Pinch of salt
- Items for dipping, such as fresh fruit (whole strawberries, bananas cut on the diagonal or clementine wedges); candied orange or yuzu peel; pieces of mochi; shortbread cookies, biscotti or graham crackers; madeleines or hunks of pound cake
Ingredient Substitution Guide
Nutritional analysis per serving (2 servings)
391 calories; 28 grams fat; 17 grams saturated fat; 0 grams trans fat; 8 grams monounsaturated fat; 1 gram polyunsaturated fat; 42 grams carbohydrates; 4 grams dietary fiber; 35 grams sugars; 4 grams protein; 88 milligrams sodium
Note: The information shown is Edamam’s estimate based on available ingredients and preparation. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
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Preparation
Step
1
Set up a fondue pot, if you have one. If you don’t, set a heatproof rack — one that can securely hold a small heatproof bowl — over a candle or can of heating fuel (such as Sterno). Or, take a pot or bowl large enough to fit a small heatproof bowl inside it and fill with boiling water; the water should reach about halfway up the outside of the small bowl once it’s set inside the pot.
Step
2
Put the chocolate in your fondue pot or small heatproof bowl. Heat the cream in a small saucepan over medium until steaming and bubbling around the edges. Pour over the chocolate, add the salt and stir gently until smooth.
Step
3
Set the chocolate over the heat source and serve immediately, with items of your choice for dipping.
Ratings
4
out of 5
90
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Cooking Notes
JP in CO
We always add a tablespoon of Grand Marnier, Kahlua, bourbon, or whatever happens to be in the liquor cabinet, except when we make it for the grandchildren.
Hillary
The Swiss Cookbook had a memorable chocolate fondue made from cream and Toblerone bars.
SarahH
I wonder if the place Ligaya Mishan had the chocolate fondue was La Fondue in mid-town. It delighted me as a kid in the 80's and saved my sanity a few times in the 90's when my gen X life was so awful that only a bowl of cheese and/or chocolate shared with too many friends squeezed around a little table would do.
Cathy in Idaho
This is just basically ganache.
Brenda
Double the recipe. Easy and delicious
Route66Gal
can I heat up the cream in a microwave?
Richard X
You need hot cream. Heat it however is convenient for you.
Hannah
We made this for a group dinner and the results were wonderful! We paired with strawberries, pineapple, clementine slices, marshmallows, & pound cake pieces. It was a great use of our fondue pot we would love to use more! Will do this for future dinners as our kids especially LOVED it!!
pekio meow
Only a handful of comments here but they did not disappoint! any recommendations or thoughts on type of chocolate?
Peter
I used dark chocolate (85% minimum cocoa). A splash of rum for depth, a healthy few dashes of cinnamon to bring warmth, and some honey to balance the slight but wonderful bitterness from the dark chocolate. Don't forget the salt to sharpen the flavors!
Richard X
I used GHIRARDELLI 60% Cacao Bittersweet Chocolate Premium Baking Chips and was happy with the results. I have previously used Jacque's House 70% Dark Chocolate Baking Discs, which was good also. I like to add a splash (or two) of Chambord. Shortbread cookies are my favorite delivery vehicle.
SarahH
I wonder if the place Ligaya Mishan had the chocolate fondue was La Fondue in mid-town. It delighted me as a kid in the 80's and saved my sanity a few times in the 90's when my gen X life was so awful that only a bowl of cheese and/or chocolate shared with too many friends squeezed around a little table would do.
JP in CO
We always add a tablespoon of Grand Marnier, Kahlua, bourbon, or whatever happens to be in the liquor cabinet, except when we make it for the grandchildren.
Hillary
The Swiss Cookbook had a memorable chocolate fondue made from cream and Toblerone bars.
Richard X
Without the cookbook and without the recipe, this doesn't tell me much. How is cream and a Toblerone bar different from the cream and chocolate specified in this recipe? Chocaholics want to know!
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