• 100 g/4 oz darkest chocolate, broken into pieces
• 6 tablespoons ginger wine
• 2.5 cm/1 in piece fresh ginger
• whites of 2 large eggs
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 150 g/5 oz demerara sugar
• 5 tablespoons water
• 75 g/3 oz ginger in syrup
• 300 ml/½ pint whipping cream

Put the chocolate and 4 tablespoons of the ginger wine into a bowl set over a saucepan of hot but not bubbling water. Stir until melted and smooth, then remove the bowl from the hot water and leave on one side.

Peel the fresh ginger and chop finely. Put the egg whites and salt into a bowl and whisk to form soft peaks. Then put the chopped ginger, the demerara sugar and water in a saucepan over a lowish heat. Stir all the time until the sugar has dissolved, then increase the heat and bring to the boil. Boil fiercely, without stirring, for 3 minutes. Pour at once in a thin stream on to the egg whites, whisking all the time at high speed. Continue whisking until cool and thick, then whisk in the remaining ginger wine.

Chop the ginger in syrup into small pieces. Whisk the cream until thick and, using a metal spoon, fold it thoroughly into the egg white mixture with the chopped ginger in syrup. The melted chocolate should still be soft enough to drop from a spoon; if not, reheat slightly. Then drop spoonfuls of the chocolate on to the ice cream mixture but do not stir in. Finally pour the mixture into a serving bowl — glass looks best — and freeze for several hours or overnight.