I saw a few recipes for green tea chocolate on-line one during a late late night internet crawl on the computer. And what I found is that this combination of white chocolate and green tea was just too good to resist.Green tea powder, or matcha (抹茶), has unique bitter taste to it. The flavor of “matcha” is quite different from the “green tea” served at Japanese restaurants. Matcha is typically used for making tea at traditional Japanese tea ceremony. This tea tends to be quite thick and very very bitter, but it goes quite well with wagashi (和菓子), traditional Japanese confectioneries that are very sweet by itself.
The color of matcha is a bright, beautiful green color, so if your matcha powder doesn’t have that nice vivid hue to it, your matcha is well past its prime. The green tea powder is also quite pricey, especially if it is tea ceremony quality, but culinary grade is good enough for baking and making these chocolates.
To change it up for the holidays, I added a bit of peppermint extract to the mix. Given the absolutely delightful green color, these little treats are just perfect for a holiday party. You can even present them as a hostess gift during the holiday season.
In order to make the perfect batch of green tea white chocolate, be sure to read the Cook’s Notes at the end of this post.
Enjoy!
Photo Credit: Seonkyoung Longest
1/2 teaspoon Peppermint extract*
2 Tablespoons unsalted butter
Add the heavy cream to a small saucepan. Heat the cream over medium heat until just about to simmering. Remove from heat.
Photo Credit: Namiko Chen, Just One Cookbook, 2014
Meanwhile in a large mixing bowl, add white chocolate. Pour the hot heavy cream over chocolate and stir until it is melted with a rubber spatula. If chocolate is not melting and the mixture gets cold, microwave for 10 seconds at a time and stir.
Photo Credit: Seonkyoung Longest, 2014
When the chocolate and heavy cream has been well combined, add the peppermint extract* and butter. Stir gently until the white chocolate mixture is smooth and creamy.
Photo Credit: Seonkyoung Longest, 2014
Sift in green powder right on top of chocolate mixture and stir gently until green tea is combined smoothly.
Photo Credit: Seonkyoung Longest, 2014
Pour green tea chocolate into an 8 x 8-inch baking pan lined with parchment paper. Spread top evenly and place in a refrigerator for 2 to 3 hours.
Photo Credit: Seonkyoung Longest, 2014
Remove the chocolate from the refrigerator after it had set and is hardened. Lift the parchment paper to remove the green tea chocolate from the baking dish and separate the parchment paper. Run the sharp knife under hot water to warm up the knife and wipe it dry completely.Cut the chocolate into 1 x 1-inch squares or any size that you desire.
Photo Credit: Namiko Chen, Just One Cookbook, 2014
Photo Credit: Seonkyoung Longest, 2014
Dust the squares with the remaining green tea powder.
Photo Credit: Namiko Chen, Just One Cookbook, 2014
Store in an airtight container in a refrigerator but it’s best taste when it’s room temperature.
IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ BEFORE MAKING THIS RECIPE
Make sure the all of the bowls and utensils that you are using are perfectly DRY. Even a small amount of water/steam can “seize” the chocolate melting process.
When buying white chocolate, make sure that it contains cocoa butter because some inferior brands contain vegetable fat. White chocolate should be ivory-colored (white chocolate made with vegetable fat is white-colored).Valrhona makes a very good white chocolate consisting 35% cocoa butter and 21.5% milk and has a lightly sweet profile with a very fine consistency Valrhona’s oval discs are the perfect presentation for baking, melting and nibbling. Lindt White Chocolate Classic Bars are also a good alternative to use in this recipe.
Note that the fat content for heavy (whipping) cream is 38%
The green color will vary based on the type of green tea that is being used.
*1/2 teaspoon Vanilla extract can be substituted for the Peppermint extract as seen in the original recipe.
To get a more even color, dissolve the tea in the cream and then heat the cream to the simmer point, and proceed with the recipe as written.