How To Make Chocolate At Home - Chef Cynthia Louise
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How to Make Chocolate at Home, It’s clear to me that the more I buy chocolate, the more money I spend… and that’s ok in lots of ways as it’s keeping the economy alive, and that’s cool!

Some days I make chocolate on request, or I just make it cause I have the urge to have bulk amounts in the freezer – yes freezer!  Freezing your homemade chocolate is a great way to keep it fresher than in the fridge. Simply take what you want out and let it rest at room temp for a few minutes then… EAT!  

My chocolate making recipes have come a long way. I started long ago using cocoa powder, sweetener and coconut oil, then I changed the fat to cacao butter, cacao powder and sweetener.

Nowadays I don’t use cacao powder anymore. I use cacao paste or liquor, cocoa butter and sweetener, and boy has this made a massive difference to the texture. It’s truly next level chocolate.

What is there not to love about truly decadent chocolate that feels somewhat like a store bought bar of LINDT chocolate?! That’s the kinda texture I’m speaking of when I say my recipes have changed…

The love of chocolate, what is there not to love?

When I talk about chocolate with my friends, we come to this point that we get all those lovely memories and feelings every time we eat chocolate together. It’s epic and delicious at the same time. 

Chocolate is such a big part of our lives – well mine anyways – but do you have any idea how we get it? It’s story time guys!

Well, it all starts with chocolate pods, which can be of different colours. If you get a chance to pick one from a tree, you can open it up, and you’ll find incredible, sticky, tiny seeds covered in white stuff that looks much like garlic. If you taste one of these, you will sense a mild flavour similar to lychee or mango, but if you bite it… OMG, it’s so bitter! You’ll immediately run to the bin and spit it out… 

…Anyway, these seeds are put into barrels to ferment, and they go from one barrel into another until the fermentation time is up (ALL CACAO SEEDS ARE FERMENTED). They are then tipped onto a huge platform when this process of fermentation is over. They are left on this platform so that the sun can dry all the stickiness and white stuff off.

From here, the fermented seeds travel to a massive big oven where they are roasted on a very low heat. At this point, the seeds are no longer white and sticky and don’t resemble garlic at all. Instead, they are much smaller in size and light to dark brown in colour. Actually, they look like small very dark brown almonds. OMG, it’s getting exciting!

These roasted seeds are then taken to a massive stone mill where they are ground so that they come out as a paste. We are getting closer to that chocolate that we love so much. The paste is then pressed, and BOOM, out comes cacao butter and cacao powder. How cool is that?!! This just makes me so excited.

So Here Is How We Make Chocolate At Home – Grab the Kids and Have Some Fun

Okay, now I want you to take some cacao butter. Fill a saucepan with water, set a pot on top of it and bring the water to the boil. Let it boil for some time, then turn off the heat. Shave your cacao butter, add it to the pot and let it melt naturally. Then, shave some chocolate paste. It is as bitter as a bark, just taste or smell it. Then smell the melted cacao butter; it’s pure fat. Now combine the two fragrances. It smells like chocolate! 

Anyway, let’s get back to this chocolate making business…..

Melt the cacao paste in the same way as the cacao butter. Now you have the two basic ingredients, but don’t rush. I can understand your impatience, but don’t risk ruining your chocolate.

So, when you take the upper pots where the melted butter and paste are, make sure to wipe away every bit of moisture so that water doesn’t go into the chocolate. And here comes the fun part. Just pour the melted butter into the melted paste and give it a stir.

Now is the time to add something sweet to this chocolate, don’t you think so?

Take that glorious maple syrup and feel free to play and add as much, or as little as you want. 

But don’t stop at the maple syrup though.

Add a pinch of salt and add some essential oils, like peppermint, orange, ginger, tangerine, cayenne – anything you like.

Get your moulds ready, fill them up, pop them into your fridge and BOOM!

This is next-level chocolate guys, made right at home in just a few minutes.

Try it out and share your chocolate creations with me on Facebook.
 

INGREDIENTS 

  • 250g cacao butter
  • 200g cacao liquor or cacao paste
  • 1/2 cup maple syrup plus an extra 2 tbsp

  • 1/2 tsp vanilla powder
  • pinch salt


METHOD

To prepare the chocolate:

  • Prepare two pots – one for the cacao butter and the other for the cacao paste. 
  • Finely chop the cacao butter and paste.
  • Add the cacao butter to the top of your double boiler (the pot with hot water), let it melt and set aside.
  • Add the cacao paste to the top of the double boiler, melt and set aside. 

Tip the melted cacao butter into the cacao paste, add the remaining base ingredients and mix well to incorporate. 

Combine the chocolate base with any of the flavour combos above.

Pour into your mold or ice cube tray and place in the freezer to set. 

Pop the chocolate treats out and enjoy!

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cooking time: 2-5 minutes

Serves: Makes 28 chocolates per batch

Freezer friendly: YES

Love,
Chef Cynthia


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About the Author

Chef Cynthia Louise is an Internationally acclaimed MasterChef, speaker, author, restaurant consultant, teacher and television presenter in wholefood, dairy-free cooking. She also has the worlds first online cooking classes focused on dairy-free plant-based whole foods with recipes that people are raving about and changing people's health, one delicious bite at a time. Chef Cynthia loves nothing more than educating people about the simplicity and vitality of a plant-based, whole foods lifestyle. Each dish is like art on a plate and her flavour combinations nourish the soul and get everyone talking.

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