Chocolate is always a good idea and with homemade chocolate it gets even better. And say what, healthy chocolate?* This DIY chocolate recipe is definitely one to keep!

Ingredients

Make sure you have these three ingredients and you’re ready to start:

  • Cocoa butter (the edible fat extracted from the cocoa bean)
  • Cocoa
  • Some sweetener like honey, maple-syrup or agave syrup

You can spice up your chocolate and make your personal flavours by adding one of the following ingredients:brazil-nut-638972_1280

  • Grated coconut
  • Goji berries
  • Nuts, like walnuts or Brazil nuts (in wholes or crushed)
  • Raisins
  • A pinch of salt or chilli will add an extra bite
  • Cocoa nibs for a crispy effect
  • Cinnamon
  • Vanilla extract

Make magic happen

Now you’ve got the main ingredients, it is time to make the magic happen. There are only six (fairly easy) steps in the chocolate making process.

Step 1: Melt 60-70 grams of cocoa butter au bain marie
How? Simple: you’ll need two pans that fit into each other. Fill the biggest one with water and make sure the smaller one can ‘float’ in it. Put the cocoa butter in the upper pan and make sure there’s no water coming in. Put both pans on the stove and wait for the water to heat up which will slowly melt the butter.

Step 2: Add 50 grams of cocoa to the melted butter.
Again: make sure there’s not one drip of water coming into the upper pan, otherwise your chocolate will clotter.

Step 3: Add one tablespoon of sweetener of your choice.
Now it’s time to taste and add some more sweetener when you think it’s needed.

Step 4: Add one or two (or three, or four… ) from the extra ingredients to the melted chocolate.

Step 5: After you’ve stirred the chocolate for a while, it is time to pour the melted chocolate into an ice cube tray or other form.
Put the tray/form in the freezer and wait for about 20 minutes - if you use a small cubes tray like on the picture. If your cubes are bigger, it might take a little longer.

Step 6 (and we think this is the best one): Time to pop out your chocolates and enjoy!

Don’t forget to let us know how you liked your home made chocolate & share your favourite secret ingredients.

*Okay there’s one small footnote to take into account: unfortunately ‘healthy’ does not mean that this chocolate is without calories.

**Nice to know: cocoa butter melts at exactly 37 degrees celcius -our body temperature-, this is why cocoa butter is a common ingredient for bodylotions.