Cereal milk panna cotta with mint and chocolate sauce

Panna cotta has become my "white whale" of sorts recently. I’ve tried on 3 separate occasions to make what I thought was this very simple dessert, and I’ve failed to some extent each time: twice when it did not set correctly and once where it was just bland. However this panna cotta is packed with flavors. The cereal I used was Cinnamon Toast Crunch, which is just a punch of cinnamon and sugar; it brought a lot of flavor to the custard.

This recipe is a combo of my mom’s friend’s recipe she got when she took cooking classes in Italy, and I’m thankful she shared it with me. The other part of it is the famed Momofuku cereal milk panna cotta with praline ganache and avocado puree. I liked the idea of cereal milk for the panna cotta, and decided to use a really sugary one like cinnamon toast crunch, I thought it would pair really well with a mint sauce, and both go with chocolate so I added that for a little contrast. Finally, since everything was the same texture I wanted to add a nice crunch to the dish, so I toasted some hazelnuts and walnuts, then I candied them with some sugar and volia, texture!

Cereal milk panna cotta

1 L cream

75 grams fine sugar

3 gelatin sheets

3 cups cereal, I used Cinnamon Toast Crunch

5-10 mint leaves and steams

2 Tbsp milk

Chocolate syrup

½ cup hazelnuts and walnuts

Directions

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Place 3 cups of cereal on pan with nuts and toast for 10 minutes.
2. Toss nuts with sugar in a pan over low heat and then place in a bowl to let cool.
3. Steep toasted cereal in 1 liter of cream for 40 minutes. Strain into a separate bowl, then strain again into a saucepan.
4. Heat cream until simmering, bloom gelatin sheets for 3-5 minutes in cold water, then wring out and add to hot cream. Stir cream mixture until gelatin sheets dissolve.
5. Pour cream into 5-8 bowl/ramekins and refrigerate for at least two hours and up to a few days.
6. For mint puree, combine milk and mint in a blender, blend until combined.
7. To place, run a knife down the side of the panna cotta and place a plate on top of it and flip. Pour a Tbsp of the mint puree onto the side of the plate, right next to it make a circular dollop of chocolate syrup and top with the candied nuts, enjoy!