Healthy Chocolate? Yes!

Healthy chocolate? There is such a thing!

I want to make high-quality, healthy chocolate, such that I decide what its ingredients will be and the amount of the sugar in it.

Years of culinary wandering around the world of desserts produced quite frustrating results.

I was looking for a chocolate recipe. One that I prepared myself and did not need to elegantly melt it in an au bain-marie (double-boiler), trying to convince myself that after the melted chocolate took its permanent shape in the pattern of petit fours, I could present the final result as chocolates I made myself.

Recipe after recipe that purports to teach how to make chocolate simply sent me once again to melt a package of ready-to-eat chocolate and just reshape it, while adding things like nougat cream and nuts that will give me the feeling as if I’m behind the preparation of this chocolate.

But all that didn’t satisfy me.

I want to make high-quality, healthy chocolate, such that I decide what its ingredients will be and the amount of the sugar in it. I would prepare from raw ingredients alone, without fooling myself that simply changing the shape from chocolate squares that came from a factory into chocolate with rounded corners and a few nuts on top, I could claim a prize.

And in the end it happened.

So how do you make healthy chocolate?

Healthy Chocolate

Ingredients

100 grams cocoa butter (6 ½ tablespoons)

50 grams of cocoa powder (3 ¼ tablespoons)

50g of coconut sugar or honey (3 ¼ tablespoons)

almond butter to taste

(optional) walnuts, hazelnuts, sugar-free cranberries, or peanuts

(optional) 100% hazelnut butter with no added sugar

Preparation

1. Melt the cocoa butter in a double-boiler.

2. Add the cocoa powder.

3. Add a generous amount of almond butter.

4. Add the coconut sugar or honey.

5. Optional:

   • Add walnuts, hazelnuts, sugar-free cranberries, peanuts, or any other additives that you like.

   • Add the hazelnut butter.

     6. Pour into a mold designed to make chocolates, and then transfer to the refrigerator or freezer.

Chocolate – Coconut Candy

Ingredients

1 cup of coconut

¼ cup of coconut sugar

1 tablespoon of honey

Preparation

1. Mix together the coconut, coconut sugar, and honey.

2. Arrange in the chocolate mold and freeze.

3. After all of the individual candies harden, remove from the mold.

4. Dip each individual candy into the chocolate topping from the Healthy Chocolate recipe above.

5. After each of the candies are frozen, cover each one on all sides and return each candy to its place in the chocolate mold.

6. Transfer to the refrigerator or freezer to cool further.

Some good reasons to eat the chocolate you’ve prepared:

• Cocoa contains magnesium and anti-oxidants at the highest concentration of any other food in the world.

• Cocoa raises serotonin levels in the brain which gives us a good feeling. It is rich in minerals iron and zinc.

• Cocoa butter is produced from cocoa beans and also contains anti-oxidants and nutrients that favorably affect mood and the immune system.

• Almond butter is very powerful and nutritious. It is rich in vitamins and minerals such as iron, calcium, and magnesium. It is a high quality plant protein.

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Danit Milner is a mind-body therapist in natural medicine. She specializes in therapy through nutrition, herbs, nutritional supplements, reflexology, massage, yoga, guided imagery, and iridology. Questions can be directed to her email: danitmilner@gmail.com.