30 Days of Christmas: Pomegranate Bark

NY Times' food section is responsible for some of the most popular food innovations of our time. Remember the No Knead bread that started a huge revolution in bread making. This pomegranate bark might be another one of those memorable inventions. Melissa Clark calls the chocolate bark the workhorse of holiday recipes. This one certainly is, with a recipe that's almost impossible to mess up.

You melt 140 grams of dark chocolate, add 20 grams of finely minced candied ginger and 1/2 cups of fresh pomegranate seeds. Spread this on a baking sheet lined with parchment and top with another 1/2 cup of pomegranate and a tsp of sea salt, pressing lightly to make sure the seeds and salt stick to the chocolate. Let cool until set.

Because of the juicy pomegranate burst you get when you bite into it, the bark has a fresh flavour, quite unlike the rich chocolates you will be used to eating. And that flavour combination of bitter dark chocolate tangy sweet pomegranate and spicy ginger truly works. Just be sure to use pomegranate seeds at room temperature (I tried first with cold seeds from the fridge and the chocolate seized) and eat this the day the bark is made to avoid condensation. Not that the eating part is ever going to be a problem around here!

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