To make the chocolate:
Place at least 2cm of water in a pot and put a bowl on the top to make a bain-marie. Don’t let the bowl touch the water. Heat the pot until the water boils, then remove from the heat.
Add cacao butter to the bowl.Stir until melted. It melts pretty quickly into a clear but yellowish oily liquid
I'm melting...
Add salt (optional)
Add 3 tablespoons of the dextrose syrup. You can add more if you wish- depends on how sweet you want it to be. (For those who've been off sugar for a while, even 3 tablespoons may make it too sweet. You can add less if you want to)
Add 2 teaspoons of the watery-lecithiny mixture (see pic of what our lecithin mixture looked like- ours was not fully dissolved in the hot water but the lecithin granules were soft and pretty quickly broke down further in the chocolate mixture).
Lecithin is an emulsifier, and we wanted it to help the syrup and cacao butter to mix better- which on our observation it seemed to. The original recipe did not have this step at all, so you could leave it out if you prefer, but I’ve left it in because we think that it helped the texture of our chocs. Note: I've since made this chocolate without the lecithin and it still seems to work- perhaps because of the small amount of syrup which is added. In a few chocolates, the dextrose syrup seemed to 'bunch up' once the chocolate solidified, meaning that one part of the chocolate was sweeter than the rest- but this is not a big deal once you put the whole piece in your mouth... point is, if you don't have lecithin, or you can't use it (because of a soy allergy or intolerance) you can probably still try the recipe without this step.
Add half of the 100% cacao, stir until it melts into the mixture, and then add the second half and do the same.
Ours had a bit of a foamy look on the surface as you can see. I think on reflection this was the lecithin and perhaps I should have left it to dissolve further. However, it didn’t affect the texture (which was entirely smooth) or taste of the final chocs.
The liquid at this point was very thin, much thinner than I was expecting to be honest.
Pour into molds or ice trays.
Ours made 36 chocs- 16 in the heart mold and 16 in the ice cube tray.
Put in the freezer or fridge to set. Ours went in the fridge and by about ½ hour they were set enough to pop out of the mold and eat. Here they are again.
My babies. I'm so proud.
As it doesn't have any cream or milk, it obviously makes a pretty dark chocolate which we estimate tastes about the same as 80% dark chocolate. Mum pronounced it ‘as good as Lindt’. The texture is chocolate heaven- it melts so deliciously in the mouth. When I do it again, I’ll experiment with adding some chopped hazelnuts or similar to the chocolate in the last step. Yum!
I guess the only other thing worth posting is the cost. The cacao 100% bar was $20 and we used 40g so $4.44 worth. The cacao butter was $19 for 250g and we used 80g, so $6.08 worth. So the main ingredients cost $10.52 for 36 chocs. Up to you whether you think it is worth it- I loved doing it and will enjoy experimenting with different versions.
Note: I initially bought my 100% cacao from Jones the Grocer. However, you can order Willie's 100% cacao from this site individually, or as a gift pack of several blocks which is often cheaper. I just looked up the prices and I could order a pack of 6 of the 100% cacao blocks, and with shipping to Australia it would cost just over $80 AUD ($13.33 per block). A single block plus shipping would be about $16.70 which is cheaper than buying through Jones the Grocers ($20 per block). Hurray for the exchange rate, and thanks to Janet on the Sweet Poison forum for this tip.
If you give this recipe a go and have suggestions/add- pretty long
