Raw Chocolate

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This recipe from Wellness Mama guided me to make the most delicious little chocolates. The only problem is they are REALLY good at disappearing… like I made them on Tuesday and they are practically all gone. Oops.

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This recipe is simple and waaaay better than any processed halloween candy you may or may not have lying around the house. So throw that out – and make this instead, or just get yourself some good quality chocolate.

Here’s what you need:

1 cup of cocoa butter

1 cup of cacao powder

1/4 cup – 1/2 cup of coconut sugar (or your sweeter of choice)

1 t vanilla

optional: sea salt + peanut butter !! These make them rock extra hard!

some kind of mold (I used a rubber ice-cube tray and this chocolate mold – I suppose you could also make a bark in a sheet pan too)

Here’s what you do:

Melt the cup of cacao butter in a double boiler. Once it is melted, take off heat and mix in cacao powder + vanilla + sugar. Mix, mix, mix. Taste – and adjust as needed.

Get a cookie sheet and line with parchment paper – place molds on top. Pour liquid chocolate into molds. If you want to add peanut butter – fill mold with a bit of chocolate, then add some peanut butter and cover it up with chocolate. Add a sprinkle of good quality sea salt to the tops and let rest to harden. You can transfer to fridge – or let sit until it’s ready.

I put mine in a tupperware in the fridge… so they’d keep well and they would kind of be out of sight out of mind… that only kind of worked.

Let me know how it goes if you try it!

 

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Molten Chocolate Cookies

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I think part of my mission in my life is to find the best chocolate chip cookie recipe, one that uses good ingredients, tastes amazing, and is made with quality chocolate chips.  Well, I came close last night.

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I found this brand of chocolate chips – Guittard (which might be my new favorite chocolate chip brand) while visiting NY and used the recipe on the back of the package.  They turned out great (minus the two batches I burned, but I will blame that on our broken oven) and they had what I thought to be an appropriate amount of sugar and butter.

Mind you it did use the entire bag of chocolate chips.  But I’m OK with that.

Molten Chocolate Cookies

Ingredients:

  • 2 cups / 12 oz (Guittard) chocolate chips  (I saved a bunch of chips to mix into batter at the end)
  • 3 tablespoons butter
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1/2 cup of sugar (I used sucanat)
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 cup of all purpose flour (I used whole wheat)
  • 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder (I didn’t use this since I am without it in Germany)

Directions:

Melt chocolate chips and butter over low heat.  In a big bowl mix eggs, sugar, salt, flour, baking powder, and vanilla.  Add chocolate mixture and mix, mix, mix.  Add reserved chocolate chips (if you saved some) and mix some more.  Cover dough and let it cool in the fridge for 15-30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 375 and make beautiful little balls of cookie dough and bake for 12 minutes or until “crusty on the outside but soft in the center”.  Cool, but not for too long, because they are best when served warm.  They are pretty good cold too.

Maybe this is the reason why we all are here – to find the ultimate best chocolate chip cookie recipe.  Have you found one already?

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Chocolate

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Some people’s eyes light up when they go shoe shopping, but my eyes light up when I browse through chocolate bars.  But not just any collection of chocolate bars.  I have left my Hersheys and Nestle for something way better – organic chocolate.  With actual cocoa beans as the first ingredient rather than sugar, and with only about five real ingredients rather than ten questionable ones – it makes for a much more satisfying treat.

Today I picked up a 70% dark chocolate that was beautifully packaged by Madecasse Chocolate.  It was deliciously smooth, and perfectly paired with almonds.  So go ahead and take a stroll among the organic chocolate bars and see what treasures you find – and let me know!

 

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