Chocolate Stuffed Chillies: Chocotos
This recipe for chocolate stuffed chillies is a bit of fun rather than something to take seriously. Rocoto chillies are stuffed with a mixture of melted chocolate and cream cheese and then baked. The chocolate cream cheese is dreamy. The chillies, however, are volcanic.
Having decided on chilli as this month’s ingredient for We Should Cocoa, I rather lost the plot and ran out of inspiration. I’d just made a chilli chocolate cake so wanted to do something a bit different. I eventually plumped on chocolate chilli truffles which I was quite excited about, but in the end I ran out of time. I also had the first ripened chillies from our plot and they needed using.
Rocoto Chillies
CT is trying to breed a species of chilli called rocoto (Capsicum pubescens), so it can not only grow outdoors in the UK but will also ripen reliably. This means, all being well, we end up with a mountain of chillies to process each year. Luckily, we’re both fond of chillies and I make this chilli sauce every season, which doubles nicely as a Christmas present for chilli lovers.
Chocolate Stuffed Chillies
So stuffed chillies it was going to be. My first thought was to stuff them with a mixture of chocolate and ricotta as I liked the idea of chocolate ricotta rocotos; thinking it through, I decided cream cheese would be a better option.
These chillies are hot and having eaten them stuffed before, I was concerned they might just blow our heads right off. Fat is one of the best methods of cooling down the capsaicin, the compound responsible for their heat; either that or sugar.
Ahhh, sugar. I had been going to use a dark 85% chocolate to mix with the cheese, but finding out about the sugar, I went for a sweeter chocolate instead. Orange chocolate was the one I chose as I thought the zingy flavour would bring out the citrus notes in the chillies.
Hope springs eternal but so does the heat of a rocoto. We had one each, eaten with a cooling chilli free cauliflower curry and rice AND they still nearly blew our heads off. Luckily a fire extinguisher was at hand in the form of the leftover filling which we spooned into our mouths in desperation.
This was only marginally cooling, but it was delicious and I think will be featuring in some future cheesecake recipe. CT said, when he recovered his voice, that it felt like someone had poured molten wax down his Eustachian tubes. I would not recommend this method of eating chillies unless you are of a particularly strong constitution.
PS the next evening CT blitzed the remaining curry for soup and included one chilli. If you like your food spicy hot, this was just about right – delicious.
Caution: If ever you try this recipe for chocolate stuffed chillies, I would advise using a much milder chilli than rocoto.
How I Made Chocotos: Chocolate Cream Cheese Stuffed Chillies
- Asked CT to do the difficult bit of decapitating and deseeding eight rocoto chillies without breaking them. No mean feat.
- Melted 30g of 47% dark orange chocolate (I used Lindt Orange Intense).
- Mixed this into 100g cream cheese.
- Using the handle end of a teaspoon, pushed this mixture into the chillies. Stuck the tops back on the chillies and placed into a greased baking dish.
- Baked on the bottom shelf of the oven whilst the rye sourdough bread was baking at 200℃ (180℃ fan, 400℉, Gas 6) and left them there for 20 minutes.
- Drizzled some more of the melted chocolate over the top.
Less Explosive Chilli Chocolate Recipes
- Chilli chocolate cake with apricot buttercream
- Cupcakes
- Fudge
- Ice cream
- Madeleines with salted caramel sauce
- Mincemeat
And if these aren’t enough, here’s a post with 30 chilli chocolate recipes in it.
Keep in Touch
Thanks for visiting Tin and Thyme. If you ever make any type of chocolate stuffed chillies, I’d love to hear about it in the comments below. Have you any top tips? Do share photos on social media too and use the hashtag #tinandthyme, so I can spot them.
For more delicious and nutritious recipes follow me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Flipboard or Pinterest. And don’t forget to SUBSCRIBE to my weekly newsletter. Or why not join the conversation in our Healthy Vegetarian Whole Food Recipes Facebook Group?
If you’d like more chilli recipes, follow the link and you’ll find I have quite a lot of them. All delicious and nutritious, of course.
Choclette x
oh you crazy chilli fiend – I shuddered in horror and some admiration at your daring – interesting to hear that sugar helps calm the heat
yippe!! love the roundup
This post is so fetish-worthy, I’ve been inspired to include it in my Friday Food Fetish blog. If you have any objections, please let me know
Ha ha ha! Great post!
Hope your tubes have recovered! What an experience, it reminds me of the time I made a Dijon Mustard Rabbit only the mustard (called Dijon) was definitely not the mild kind. We didn’t manage to finish it.
Still giggling at Dom’s first comment! Took the words right out my mouth. Has yours recovered yet and the voice? Somebody has to go ahead with these amazing experiments. Love chilli, love chocolate and adore your idea! Dynamite.
Karen – so pleased there was some level of approval 😉
Foodycat – it would certainly make you forget you had a cold for a while 😉
Hanna – I’m sure it’s because of the wonderful colours that I’m a chilli fiend.
Probably very therapeutic if you had a head cold!
LOL! Laughed my hot chilli socks of at this but secretly LOVED the idea! What a great entry!
Karen
They sound vicious but a brilliant idea, they look really pretty with the bright red chilli!
Baking Addict – crazy indeed. I hadn’t been expecting them to be quite that hot. The filling was so good, I now have cheesecake very much in mind.
Suelle – err, no probably not 😉
Kath – I’m not sure it was bravery so much as poor memory syndrome! Do hope you can get your truffles made, they sound fabulous.
Nora – indeed this one is not for you if you need convincing, but I’m sure you’ll find something to tempt you in the round-up.
Carl – ha ha, rash is the word, but sometimes these things just have to be tried.
Laura – good luck.
Cake Fairy – ah, glad you see a certain appeal.
Little Loaf – think I’ll stick with the chilli hot chocolate for a while!
WLM – yes boiling them first would probably reduce the heat. Worth trying if ever I have the courage to do this again!
Chele – yes, it’s a good combination but am thinking orange chocolate cheesecake with a smidgen of chilli in it for next time 😉
Gloria – you are kinder than the others 🙂
Hazel – I saw the vodka soaked chilli recipe in the book so it’s good to have some feedback. I would imagine the chillies would be hard to stuff if they were soft.
Saji – thanks :-S
Michelle – more of a “hot” idea really, but probably not a very good one 😉
WOW!! Seriously even I wouldn’t attempt this… but OMG what a truly cool idea!
Ha ha truly amazing Idea
Wow! You’ve done a great job here. I tried making chocolate vodka chillis from G&B’s chocolate cookbook, but, unfortunately, they looked like a complete mess by end of it. I tried to stuff them with vodka chocolate after soaking the chillis in vodka. But it was an epic fail. You have really done a great job, even if you only eat one a year as they are so hot!
what amazing idea!! gloria
aaargh sounds hardcore! Do you think if they were parboiled first they might have lost a bit of the heat? (just wondering as the idea is good clearly the heat needs somehow to be taken down…!!)
This looks absolutely bonkers! Think the extent of my chocolate chilli love is chilli hot chocolate, but very impressed with you for trying these! 🙂
You truly are a hard core chilli fiend. Fantastic idea though and i really like the idea of the orange chocolate pairing.
Haha you’re crazy! 🙂 A whole Chilli! I kinda want it though…strange!
You have made a dish that suits me down to the ground! I am an absolute chilli addict and LOVE my chilli heat. So, this recipe I will be recreating for sure:-)
LOL, that was a very rash thing to do. My rocotos are pretty punchy and I really wouldn’t expect to eat one whole and come out unscathed.
All the interests of building bridges between botany and cuisine via a trip to the ENT/Burns clinic.
Top marks for courage…
chilli chocolate ganache made – I will try to blog it later and meet the 12pm deadline 🙂 x
Wowsers!! I’m still not totally convinced by the chocolate/chilli combination, so I’m skipping this challenge – but looking forward to seeing what everyone comes up with so I can find the dish that can convert me. However, I don’t think this will be it! I’m really impressed you gave it a go though! Though would it work better with a less hot chilli?
You two are very brave! What a brilliant idea. Not sure I would have been brave enough to try them though, although Mr OC would love them. I have been meaning to make chilli choc truffles all month and haven’t managed it – very sorry….
Brave idea, but I don’t think you’re really supposed to use hot chillies for this kind of thing! LOL!
Wow definitely a novel idea. Stuffed chillies with curry albeit chilli free still sounds crazy! Love the sound of your filling though but would like mine sans chilli please 🙂
Dom – ha ha, I think I must be.
Jesus friggin Christ woman are you insane? Although secretly a small part of me wishes I had been there with you at the tasting!!