Fresh pomegranate seeds (actually called arils) are a little too moist to do well in a batch of cookies. Dried pomegranate seeds are a little bit too dry and crunchy. Dark Chocolate Covered Pomegranate seeds, however, seem to be just right. The dark chocolate brings out some of the fruity notes of the dried pomegranate flesh, while it also serves to temper the crunch of the pomegranate seed.
They go particularly well in these rich, brownie-like chocolate cookies. Don’t be fooled by the “dry” outer appearance of the cookies – just think of that as the very top of the brownie. Inside, these are moist and very tender, with an excellent chocolate flavor. In addition to the chocolate covered seeds, I also included some chocolate chips and chopped, toasted pecans in here, so there is a real variety of textures and flavors (and a lot of chocolate, of course!) in each bite of cookie.
If you can’t find dark chocolate covered pomegranate seeds (which I found at Trader Joe’s), don’t worry. You can easily substitute another chocolate covered dried fruit, such as blueberries or cranberries, to get the tanginess of the fruit into the cookies. You could also use chocolate covered cacao nibs to replicate that hint of crunch from the pomegranate seeds. And, of course, you can just add in dried fruit, more chocolate chips or even more nuts depending on what you have in the pantry.
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Pomegranates are delicious fruits, but they are a little bit trickier to eat than, for instance, an apple, due to all of their jewel-like seeds. They’re not that easy to incorporate into recipes – particularly recipes for baked goods – unless you’re looking to use just the juice. Once, I bought a big bag of dried pomegranate seeds, planning to put them into some cookies or muffins and thinking that they would be similar to other dried fruits. They weren’t. They were mostly seed and had virtually no flavor apart from the crunch of the seed. I put aside the bag and wrote off dried pomegranate seeds.
My moratorium lasted until I saw a box of Dark Chocolate Covered Pomegranate Seeds at Trader Joe’s recently. I was tempted to see how the little seeds would do with a chocolate coating. Fortunately, it was a huge improvement! The dark chocolate was rich and flavorful, its fruitiness matching nicely with the hint of pomegranate flavor you get from the dried pomegranate. The seeds themselves work well here, too, because inside of the chocolate they take on a cacao nib-like crunch that is very pleasant. Unlike the plain dried pomegranate seeds, these work well for adding flavor and texture to things like cookies and cakes, and they’re not a bad snack for munching, either.
Pomegranates are packed with antioxidants, which means that there are a lot of potential health benefits packed into each fruit. Pomegranates are a bit difficult to eat, since each little seed – although tasty – doesn’t have a lot of juice or flesh surrounding it, so it takes quite a while to consume one. This is where pomegranate juice comes in, making it easy to enjoy the flavor of pomegranate without the work involved in eating a whole fruit. The juice can be used in many different types of dishes, and while I often see it reduced in a sauce, I used some to sweeten up a chocolate bundt cake.
This cake is moist, chocolaty and has a tender, but slightly dense, texture. It’s a great bundt cake because it’s easy to make and each slice is satisfying to eat. I used pomegranate juice as the primary liquid in this cake, where I might use milk, buttermilk or coffee in another chocolate cake. There is a lot of cocoa powder in here, so you can’t directly taste the pomegranate flavor in the cake. You can definitely tell the juice is there, however, because there is a lovely fruity sweetness to the cake that adds some complexity to the flavor. Not wanting to skimp on the chocolate, I incorporated some chocolate chips into this cake, too.
I used POM Wonderful pomegranate juice in this cake, because it is pure pomegranate juice and not simply flavored white grape juice. Definitely take the time to look for pure juice when you make this cake, both for that fruity flavor and for the antioxidants (don’t forget that there are also plenty in the cocoa powder in this cake!). It’s pretty easy to justify having a second piece when you can say you’re doing it for health reasons!
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