fresh chocolate bread

A friend from grad school and her husband used to throw fantastic parties on their porch. Highlights in my mind include wicked good mojitos and her homemade chocolate bread, served with marscapone cheese. Before we left Illinois for porch-free climes, I made sure to snag the recipe for the bread. This is a fine, fine dessert bread, made with cocoa powder and best-quality bittersweet chocolate chips, with rich and color. The marscapone cheese adds richness and a bit of tanginess. Fantastic for any occasion, as they say... I've made it twice in recent weeks, once for an occasion, and once to devour, alone in my apartment, while watching TV...

The full recipe is here, and I have adapted a dough-cycle bread-machine version as well for people too lazy to knead. But basically it's a standard white bread with melted butter and sugar added to the dough, followed by a quarter cup of cocoa powder (not Dutch-process as you want the tanginess) and a half cup of chocolate chips (I like Ghirardelli's 60% chips). Knead, rise, form two round loaves, proof, and bake at 425 for 10 minutes and then 375 for 20. Brush the top with more melted butter and serve with marscapone cheese, and (optionally) with mojitos...