Tag Archives: dark chocolate

Valentine’s Day Trail Mix

I broke down, and had to purchase personalized M&M’s for my husband for Valentine’s Day. The process of ordering the M&M’s was too much fun with selecting any color, adding cute little sayings, and pictures. I was able to order them with Groupon one of my favorite apps which decreased the overall cost. My whole intent of ordering the M&M’s was to make him trail mix with these “melt in your mouth” American staples.

I added all his favorite fixings into the mix. Trail mix is one of his favorite snacks, and is great in between meals as a satisfying sweet and salty treat.

Ingredients:

1 cup dried cranberries

1 1/4 cup roasted sunflower seeds, lightly salted

1 cup whole cashews, lightly salted

2 cup peanuts, lightly salted

1 cup M&M’s

1 cup Ghirardelli 60% cacao chips

1/4 cup pepita seeds

Directions:

1. Mix all the ingredients into a sealable container. Lock the lid on the container & give the container a few gentle shakes to distribute all the ingredients throughout.

2. Store the trail mix in the sealed container or portion out into small sealable snack baggies for travel.

Rich Brownies (dietitian not recommended)

Sometimes you have to spurge and go all out. I have been looking for a good fudgy brownie that’s not out of the box and without all the extras. I think I found a winner.

Ingredients:

3 oz 70% dark chocolate
3 oz of semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 stick of butter
1 tsp instant coffee granules
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
2/3 cup AP flour
1 cup of sugar
2 tsp vanilla pure extract
3 eggs (farmer fresh or egg-lands best)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Foil line an 8 by 8 pan, make sure to leave extra over sides to serve as a handles. Spray pan with cooking spray.

1. Mix the flour, baking powder, instant coffee , and salt in a medium bowl. Set a side.

2. Place butter, & chocolates in a microwave safe bowl and microwave in 15 second intervals using spatula to scrape down sides in bowl each time. Make sure not to burn the chocolate.

If you rather you could use a double boiler or glass bowl over simmering water bath (I’ll leave that up to you). I prefer microwave less pans to clean.

Once the chocolate mix is melted smoothly add in vanilla & sugar.

Add one egg at a time.

Whisk after each egg addition.

Add flour blend to chocolate batter.

Mix with whisk until fully incorporated.

Pour batter into pan and spread evenly with spatula.

Bake in center of the oven for 35 minutes. You want a soft crumb on your toothpick when testing the brownie to see if finished.

Let sit in pan for 5 minutes. Remove from baking dish and let cool on wire rack.

Zucchini Dark Chocolate Cake!

Chocolate Zucchini Cake

We have zucchini coming out of our ears! And we don’t want it to go to waste! Just recently I found this recipe in FN Magazine and I have been etching to try it. I did do some modifications to add some of my own touches of course. PS it goes well with ice cream…..

Cake Ingredients:
1 medium Zucchini ( remove excess water)
1 1/2 cups AP flour, plus 1 TB
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/4 cup canola oil
1/2 Tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 oz dark chocolate chopped finely
2 oz of semi sweet chocolate chopped finely
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 cup unsweetened coco powder
2 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla

Topping
1 tsp canola oil
1/3 cup chopped dark chocolate
1 tsp honey

1. Preheat oven to 350. Spray pan with cooking spray and sprinkle/dust pan with flour.

2. Chop chocolate finely.