Pluots and chocolate

[ChocoMom]

So....I was wandering through the produce section this evening and noticed Pluots.  Never heard of them before.  They looked interesting enough that I bought a couple )each) of the orange and purple varietiIes.  

 

I'm curious to learn if anyone has had any great success with these little marvels, and morphing them into some kind of ganache - soft or firm, and what the heck kind of chocolate would work with something "very sweet and tangy"?   I tend to gravitate towards dark chocolate for almost everything- but I don't know how mild or strong the flavor is. Can it stand up to dark chocolate---say 72% or so? 

 

Just curious....I'd love to hear about your experiments with the pluot!  thanks so much! 

 

Must clean up the workshop now. It looks like a bunch of Oompa Loompas got loose and had a food fight in here.

 

Andrea

 

 

[Mjx]

You can't morph fruit pulp into a blend of cream and chocolate, and even adding fruit pulp to ganache seems likely to cause the ganache to break (based on my own experience, and pretty much everything I've read). A layered ganache and pate de fruit using pluots could be pretty good, or (going by the amazing chocolate-covered prunes I've had), you could pit and dry them, then dip them in chocolate. Dark/plain chocolate definitely seems like the way to go: of all the fruit+chocolate combinations I've tried, the fruit flavour came through much more cleanly in those made with dark chocolate.

[ChocoMom]

WOW, I never thought of drying them!  Thank you for the idea and advice! . 

 

I've made Shotts' Raspberry Wasabi truffles before, with the two layers. (Wow, those are delish- only with more wasabi!)  I was contemplating a similar approach with the pluots, by making the puree, pressing through mesh, adding the powdered sugar, cooking it down a bit, etc,... and either doing the PdF, or adding the puree right into the dark chocolate.  PdF sounds better, and more promising.

 

Well, now I have something to work with. Thank you again, and if I have any great success---I will post!  Have a wonderful day! Andrea

[Lisa Shock]

If you ever get a chance, try black apricots (an apricot-plum hybrid, as opposed to plum-apricot of a pluot) I like using them when I can in apricot confections. They show up seasonally here in PHX at Trader Joe's.

[ChocoMom]

Oh wow...that sounds great, too.  We live so far north- on the Keweenaw Peninsula- that we rarely get anything really interesting like that. That's why I was so intrigued with the Pluots.  (Thimbleberries are about as rare and delicious as far as local fruit is concerned.)   I think I'm going to check L'Epicierie and see if they have any purees from some more interesting fruits and then toy around.

Ah, so much to experiment with....so little time!   

Thank you both for the ideas and advice!  Much appreciated!!!!  Andrea