Basic Homemade Healthier Chocolate

Homemade chocolates make excellent gifts so if you are looking for something last minute for whatever holiday ya’ll throw down or even for birthdays, end of year teachers gifts, etc, I highly recommend these. You can customize them by the mold you choose. You can grab decent molds at Michael’s Art’s & Crafts. That’s where I got this Hanukkah mold actually. After the chocolates are made you can put them in a little mason jar and wrap with twine or pretty ribbon to give away or keep them all for you! I was super excited to find this cute mold this year because there’s no cleaner healthier chocolate gelt that you can buy. Gelt is what the chocolate coins are called during Hanukkah. You can easily double this recipe to make more. I did use another mold from The Pampered Chef that I had to use up the rest of the chocolate mix.

You might see recipes for making chocolate just with coconut oil. That is okay if you are just going to drizzle chocolate on something, but if you want your chocolate to keep shape, and set like chocolate you’d buy at the store, then be sure to use the cacao butter.

Basic Chocolate Recipe
114 Grams Cacao Butter (The kind in the big chunks works too like this)
1/2 Cup Organic Raw Cacao Powder (or this one)
1/4-1/3 Cup Maple Syrup (I get this from Costco for the best price)
1-2 Tsp Organic Vanilla Extract (I order this through Azure Standard or make my own)

Optional Add Ins: goji berries, Celtic salt chunks, coconut, cinnamon, cayenne, cardamom, rose petals, or even adaptagens like Perfect Supplements mushroom powder (put in mushrooms in the search bar and use our code KHWPerfect10 to save 10%, you can put this in bone broths too or just take it), ashwagandha powder, or coconut butter.

Directions:

After you gather your ingredients you will need a candy mold or two depending on the shapes and sizes of your molds. You will need a double boiler. You can certainly do a make shift one like I did with my mixing bowl, see the photo below. If you have a kitchen scale, that can really be helpful. Otherwise you can do about 1/2 cup of cacao butter. You’ll want to melt it

Next if you have a scale, go ahead and measure your cacao butter. I use grams for measurement. After you melt it, carefully remove your bowl because it will be kind of hot, and mix in your cacao powder, maple syrup, and anything you want to add in or keep it plain. My measuring cup I used for the maple syrup has a spout so once mixed I poured the chocolate mixture back into the measuring cup so I can more easily fill the mold. I also make sure to use a tempered glass measuring cup because if the melted chocolate starts to cool and thicken while I am pouring it into the molds, then I can just put it back into the pot and re-heat it. The tempered glass is safe and won’t break in the pot.

Before you fill the molds, if you have a small enough baking tray that will fit in your freezer, put the mold on it, then fill it with the chocolate. The reason I mention the baking tray is then you can easily put the tray and mold right into your freezer to help the chocolate set. If not, let the mold set up on the counter for about 30-45 minutes before moving it. Next put it in the freezer to finishing setting up for about 2 hours. If you try to move the mold into the freezer right away you are liable to make a mess and spill some of the chocolate out of the mold. The molds are very flimsy and it’s difficult to hold it just right.

Note: If you want to make more like a truffle filling, then just put a little bit of chocolate to start, your filling such as coconut butter, and then more chocolate on top.

Store them in a glass container in a cool, dark place. If you have any questions and comments, be sure to submit them. Happy chocolate making!

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