Here’s a delicious homemade chocolate recipe to help you stay healthy over Easter from whole food plant based devotee, Lorna McCormack.
As we prepare for Easter you might be feeling a little anxious about all of the colourful eggs that you may be tempted by. Well, now is the time to prepare because Easter treats don’t have to be of the synthetic ‘can’t stop eating’ kind.
Prepare this homemade chocolate bar in less than 15 minutes and keep it in the fridge for Easter Sunday.
Go to town with the optional superfoods because these are what will really ‘up’ the nutritional content of this treat.
Chocolate and Toffee Bar
Toffee bits ingredients
- 2 cups of vegan butter or almond butter
- 2 cups of brown coconut sugar
- 2 Tbsp water
- A pinch of Himalayan salt
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Chocolate ingredients
- 195g cacao butter
- 120g cacao powder
- 8 tablespoons of maple syrup
- ½ teaspoon of salt
Optional superfoods
Choose one or two of the following for adding to your chocolate mix:
- Goji berries
- Chopped pecan nuts
- Flaked almonds
- Raisins
To make the hard toffee bits
Combine the butter, sugar, water and salt in a small pot. Bring the mixture to a boil while stirring constantly. Stir until the mixture is a dark amber colour and the temperature is 150 degrees C or 300 degrees F.
Pour the mixture onto a baking tray that has been lined with parchment paper and once it’s cooled place in the fridge for 3 hours until it has hardened. Once hard, break it into small pieces for adding to the chocolate.
To make the chocolate
Place a glass bowl into a pot of simmering water. Make sure the bowl is not touching the water but just sitting above it.
Melt the cacao in the bowl, then add all of the cacao powder, maple syrup and salt. Stir the mixture until the ingredients have combined evenly and you have a smooth chocolate.
Then add the broken hard toffee pieces and your superfoods and mix through evenly.
Pour the mixture into a chocolate bar shaped mould. (If you don’t have any shaped moulds line a baking tray with parchment paper and pour the chocolate mix onto that).
Once cooled, place the tray into the fridge to set for at least 3 hours.
Once set, remove the chocolate from the mould and store in an airtight container in the fridge……if you can resist eating them all straight away.
Lorna’s top tip for beating sugar cravings
Although this recipe gives you a much healthier version of traditional Easter treats it still contains sugar which once the Easter holidays are over can still leave you wrangling with cravings. To crush these cravings straight away keep a bottle of raw apple cider vinegar on hand and when you feel that craving creeping up on you take a tablespoon of the vinegar in a small shot glass with a dash of warm water.
Ultimately the best way to get rid of cravings is to avoid refined carbs and sugary foods altogether but I get it, from time to time we all need a little extra help especially after holidays.
Raw apple cider vinegar has been shown to have many, many health benefits. It is an energy and blood sugar stabilizer, helps improve digestion, and helps curb an appetite.
If you want to read more about the many benefits of raw apple cider vinegar I’ve written a whole blog post about it over here. After reading this you’ll want to make raw apple cider vinegar a part of your daily self-care routine.
Happy Easter to you all!
Lorna’s journey to plant-based eating was fueled by her personal health challenges. It kickstarted years of study in plant-based nutritional therapy, and hundreds of hours counseling patients through their transformations via diet, alone. Now, she’s making it her life’s mission to help others discover and excel on their own journey to more mindful nutrition & natural plant based medicines. Lorna has written an informative and inspiring free 5 day course to guide people to better health. Sign up for her free course to learn more about plant based eating. During the month of April Lorna will be running her annual ‘30 Day To A New You’ FREE Challenge. If you want to take part just get yourself onto her mailing list here.
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