Chocolate bouchons are amazing cork shaped brownies found at Thomas Keller's Bouchon Bakery in Napa and NYC. The recipe is also used to make the warm chocolate brownie served at Ad Hoc, which is our favorite dessert at any restaurant in the Bay Area country. Every time we go to Napa, we have to get a fix of bouchons from the bakery or the brownie at Ad Hoc. They are extremely addicting!

Our friend, Brennan, is a total bouchon junkie. When we bring back bouchons from Napa, we have to give the brownies to Deb, Brennan's wife. Otherwise, Brennan will eat them all and neglect to tell Deb about their existence. We accidentally outed him once... oops! We thought he'd share at least one.

A few weeks ago, I made bouchons for the first time and I turned it into a battle between Valrhona and Scharffen Berger chocolate. The recipe calls for Valrhona chocolate, but I also wanted to try bouchons using Scharffen Berger. It's our favorite local chocolate maker and we've been baking almost exclusively with Scharffen Berger for the last 5 or 6 years.

Let the battle begin. The recipe uses Valrhona Equatoriale (55%) semisweet chocolate, which I couldn't find at the local supermarket. Instead, I used Le Noir Gastronomie (61% cacao), which was a good competitor to 62% semisweet Scharffen Berger chocolate. The bouchons are baked in 2 to 3 ounce flexible silicon timbale molds or baba cups. I haven't ordered the timbale molds yet, so I used silicon muffin molds. The muffin molds produce a small circular brownie similar to the brownie at Ad Hoc.

The difference in the batter was immediate. The Valrhona cocoa powder is Dutch processed and produces a darker batter compared to the naturally processed Scharffen Berger cocoa powder. In the slideshow, you should be able to notice the blacker Valrhona and the browner Scharffen Berger brownies.

Time to taste. Individually, the two brownies were each excellent. They both had a nice texture — a chewy, slightly crunchy exterior and a soft, moist interior. The Valrhona bouchon had a more intense, pure chocolate taste. Whereas, the Scharffen Berger brownie had a sweeter, fruity flavor. Hungry Bear, Deb and I preferred the Valrhona ones and surprisingly the bouchon addict, Brennan, liked the Scharffen Berger brownies more. When they were served at Thanksgiving, it was probably a 60/40 split in favor of Valrhona. In general, the people who chose Scharffen Berger tended to prefer milk chocolate over dark chocolate.

We were able to compare our brownie variations to bouchons from Bouchon Bakery... thanks Jane! Compared to the original, our brownies were very similar in taste and texture. It was hard to tell the difference, but our brownies were slightly less sweet than the real bouchons. Dare I say, we actually enjoyed our brownies more than the original!

It was quite a battle. One that needs to be repeated with different chocolates. Valrhona is the reigning champion, but who is going to step up to the challenge? Callebaut, Guittard, Ghirardelli, Lindt, I think you are being called out!

Note on the Pictures: I forgot to invert the bouchons before I sprinkled on the confectioners' sugar, so the browned top is facing down... damn! I might have to make some more to retake the photos. Who wants some brownies?

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Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc is my absolute favorite restaurant in the Bay Area. I can't think of any other restaurant that captures the spirit of Sunday Nite Dinner better than Ad Hoc. The food is rustic yet refined and served family style. The atmosphere is friendly, super casual and lacks any pretentiousness.

Ad Hoc offers a daily fixed-price ($45), four-course menu. There are no choices and only one menu is prepared each evening. The family style supper begins with a hearty soup or an extremely fresh salad, followed by a main course of seafood or meat. There's an interlude with an artisan cheese course. Then the meal is concluded with an amazing dessert.

Yesterday, Hungry Bear and I paid our fifth visit to Ad Hoc this year with our friends, Brennan and Deb. The menu was...

Haricots Verts and Potato Salad
Proscuitto di parma, walnut halves, shaved radishes,
sherry vinaigrette and fingerling potatoes

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Marinated Skirt Steak
Sautéed wild mushrooms, pea shoots and Texas 1015 onion rings

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Cowgirl Creamery Sally Jackson Goat Cheese
Marshall farm’s wildflower honey and toasted almonds

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Warm Chocolate Brownie
Whipped vanilla cream and caramel sauce

As always, the meal lived up to expectations. The green bean and potato salad was fresh and tasty with only a light dressing. The onion rings were nice and crunchy with a slight kick from the cayenne in the batter. The marinated skirt steak was perfectly cooked and melted in your mouth. I believe the highlight of the main course was the sautéed wild mushrooms (maitake, beech and oyster) with bacon lardons. If you go often, you'll notice the frequent use of applewood smoked bacon, and of course, everything is better with bacon!

The third course is always an artisan cheese course and we tend to under appreciate it, because we are excited about the upcoming dessert. Usually, I'm very full after the main course and want to save room for dessert, so the cheese gets a cursory taste. However, if you appreciate good cheese, you will love the cheese offerings at Ad Hoc.

Warm chocolate brownie with whipped cream and caramel sauce... it speaks for itself. Ok, I will say that it's the best chocolate dessert that I've ever had at any restaurant. The brownie is made with a bittersweet chocolate and there is a lovely, chewy outside and soft inside... spectacular!

After eating five amazing meals at Ad Hoc, I'll share some key insights about Ad Hoc.

• Limit your bread intake - the bread from Bouchon Bakery is fantastic, but the portions are very generous, and you need to save room for dessert.
• Ask for seconds - even with the generous portions, you can always ask for seconds if you particularly enjoy an item, side dish or dessert.
• Ask questions - the staff is extremely friendly and knowledgeable about ingredients, cooking techniques and wine, so ask away and you'll learn about sous vide cooking and plate cut short ribs.
• Signature dishes - the braised short ribs are to die for. The buttermilk fried chicken is served every other Monday. The panna cotta and Basque cake are popular desserts with the staff. A smaller version of the chocolate brownies, called bouchons, can be purchased down the street at its namesake bakery.
• Sit at the bar - can't get a reservation? Just go early and grab a bar seat. You can also order a la carte at the bar if you aren't hungry enough for a four-course meal.
• Daily Menu - the menu can be heard by calling (707) 944-2487 or by visiting Ad Hoc's daily menu. Although with the increased popularity, it is very difficult to reserve a table the same day.
• Special requests - despite the single menu each day, dietary restrictions are accommodated.

I cannot rave enough about Ad Hoc. We actually prefer going to Ad Hoc over The French Laundry. For the price, we can dine at Ad Hoc FIVE times to every French Laundry meal. Plus, we love the casual, laid-back atmosphere at Ad Hoc. And nothing beats sharing a family style meal with good friends!

Location & Hours:
Ad Hoc
6476 Washington Street
Yountville, CA 94599
(707) 944-2487
Hours: Dinner Sunday through Saturday 
Update 08.30.2007: Starting Sept. 18th, Ad Hoc will be open seven days a week.
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Update 2.29.2008: Since this post, we have gone to Ad Hoc three more times and loved each meal. Here's another slideshow of the dishes we enjoyed recently. The pictures are taken at night with a flash, which I dread doing. Nevertheless, they turned out okay and the dishes still make my mouth water!

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The Serramonte Farmers' Market in Daly City is one our favorite markets in the Bay Area. We like the Serramonte market because it's relatively small but has a good selection of vendors and plenty of parking. The market can get busy, but it's never a mob scene like other markets in the area. The farmers' market is not a tourist attraction and has a more homey feel, where the locals do their everyday shopping. That's the primary reason Hungry Bear goes there on a regular basis.

We took a trip down to the market this past Thursday and returned with a bounty of fruit and food. Hungry Bear has had a regular strawberry vendor for the last several years, but tried a new one several weeks ago. After tasting the strawberries from several vendors, we have decided to switch to the new one, Rodriguez Farms, for the foreseeable future. Their organic strawberries were the sweetest and juiciest.

This past Thursday, the mountain grown blueberries from Rainbow Orchard were very delicious. Likewise, the apricots from CMC Farms were quite good. We also picked up some chicken and beef piroshkies. We enjoyed the piroshkies (Russian meat filled pastries) but since this was our first time trying piroshkies, we have no basis for comparison. Another new find was the purple Thai chili peppers. I've had red and green chilies, but I had never seen purple ones.

A popular vendor at the Serramonte market is Roli Roti Gourmet Rotisserie. You can't miss this stall. Just follow the wonderful aroma of rotisserie chicken to his stand. He also had rotisserie pork knuckles on Thursday. It looked really good with sizzling pork fat dripping down from each knuckle. I had to pass on getting it because we just had BBQ flank steak the previous day... next time!

Another busy vendor is Gold Rush Kettle Korn, which is next to Roli Roti. We have never tried his kettle corn but there's always a line of people waiting. If nothing else, it's interesting to watch the kettle corn making process.

No shopping trip is complete until something chocolate is purchased. We achieved this goal by getting a big chocolate brownie that was shaped like a muffin. The brownie was good, but I could have used a little more chocolate flavor. As always, it was another successful shopping trip at the Serramonte Farmers' Market.

Location & Hours:
Serramonte Mall Parking Lot
3 Serramonte Center
Daly City, CA 94016
Thursdays & Saturdays 9:00 am - 1:00 pm
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