Chocolate is probably my biggest dietary downfall. It is easy to acquire, requires nearly no effort on my part to prepare and is quick and super caloric to consume. Of course, my other downfalls are wheat thins and mashed potatoes. What can I say, I love the carbs.
My favorite chocolate treats really do run the gamut, but I am hoping to not get any chocolate this year for valentines day. Eating healthy is hard enough without a box just sitting there staring at me.
1. Peanut Butter M&Ms / Pretzel M&Ms. Now, I don't even remember if these have chocolate in them (well, the pretzel ones do), but they are like a super delicious treat. I'd buy them more often if I could resist eating the entire bag at once.
2. Rolos. These are the basis for the bachelor cookies that I love. The bachelor cookies are faux turtles. Take mini pretzels and place 1 unwrapped rolo onto each pretzel. Place in an oven at 200° Fahrenheit for like 2 minutes. Just until melty. Push a pecan half into the melting rolo. Voila. Mini turtle cookies.
3. Lindt truffles. My favorites are probably the stracciatella (cookies and cream) and the white chocolate, though I'm not sure if I've ever had one that I'd consider bad. One of my friends makes hot chocolate by adding a single truffle to hot chocolate and about a tablespoon of Godiva licqueur. It is so tasty!
4. Old fashioned hot chocolate. If you don't really like drinking milk, this is a great way to get more milk into the diet. It is good with pretty much any cocoa powder I've tried, though obviously more affordable with Hersheys. I just follow the stovetop instructions on the can and mix the sugar, salt and cocoa in a bowl first (it helps prevent lumps).
5. Chocolate pudding. Another dairy source that I really like. There is this recipe on Joy the Baker that has been on my list to try since it came out, but I haven't bought the black onyx cocoa powder. I know I could try it with a more pedestrian cocoa powder, but I really want to try the black onyx. I had some last year at Baitcon and it was good but hard to differentiate from other chocolate with all of the dairy that went into it.
6. Chocolate chips. I have these tiny sake and green tea style cups and one of my go to no work desserts is to just dump about an ounce of chocolate chips in them. I love the callebaut style dark chocolate chips or mega chunks, but I don't buy them quite as often. If they are very dark and rich then I feel the urge to eat less.
7. Neuhaus. Au Chocolat has a wide assortment of them, so I love going and picking out one. They are pricy, but that isn't so big a deal if you are only eating one or two. My favorites are Seduction (raspberry ganache surrounded by a toffee and enrobed in chocolate), Frais du bois (dark chocolate with a liquid strawberry center) and Prestige (liquid caramel center). They are all very good and the frais du bois has exceptionally good mouth feel.
8. Fudge. I used to make a ton of fudge, using variants on the never fail fudge recipe from the marshmallow fluff. One of my friends doesn't like the fluff-based recipe and so I've been trying to find a fudge recipe I like that doesn't use it. So far its an uphill battle. I make a lot of white chocolate based fudges, because they are the best for making alternative flavors like my maple fudge of space and time.
9. Chocolate Thin Mint Ice Cream, Chocolate Ice Cream with a Salted Caramel Swirl or Nutella Rocky Road. These are ice creams I've made for the ice cream party I hold in July. They are super chocolatey and have just enough of something else to make them eatable for people with a wider range of chocolate tolerances.
10. Salted Caramels. Au Chocolat has these in both bags and as individual pieces. I love that if I just want one, but more often my husband gets a box of them from Whole Foods and I then spend the next month having one a day. It's a good thing, because if I buy a bag from Au Chocolat and leave them in my desk at work then they are gone within minutes of opening the bag. So dangerous!
I really do love chocolate, but my current diet as it were restricts me to one sweet after dinner. Usually that sweet is a half serving of the salted caramels or Girl Scout cookies. Though I made cookies yesterday, and I will probably need to eat a larger dessert tonight!
