Showing posts with label confectionery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label confectionery. Show all posts

Wednesday, 4 March 2015

Butterscotch Cashew Nut Haystacks & Chocolate Hazelnut Haystacks

Vegan Butterscotch Cashew Nut Haystacks
A couple recipe variations on the Chocolate Peanut Butter Coconut Haystacks from awhile ago. First, Butterscotch Cashew Nut Haystacks and.....
Vegan Chocolate Hazelnut Haystacks
I often make the chocolate peanut butter coconut haystacks when I need a sweet hit as they are so easy to whip up, require no baking and are absolutely delicious. However, I've been wanting to cut out the white sugar, or at least try to and not only do they call for white sugar but on the day I needed them I also had no cocoa powder. Tragedy!

So, out of that catastrophe came the butterscotch cashew nut haystacks. Peanut butter has been swapped with cashew nut butter, coconut replaced with toasted chopped cashews and the white sugar with dark brown sugar. Yes, I know - they still have a lot of sugar. I'm not quite ready for my sweet treats to be sweetened solely with dates or some other kind of madness (I jest!) Give me time....LOTS of time ;-) But they are a bit healthier and definitely delicious.
Vegan Butterscotch Cashew Nut Haystacks
Eventually I restocked my cocoa powder, well, within a couple of hours as it's cocoa powder, hello?? That requires an emergency run to the grocery store! As I was so impressed with the addition of nuts to these I made a chocolate hazelnut version which my husband has claimed to be his absolute favourite of the three.
Vegan Chocolate Hazelnut Haystacks
So, a couple new versions for you to try and even to experiment with your own variations. Just keep the quantities the same and swap away!
Vegan Butterscotch Cashew Nut Haystacks

Butterscotch Cashew Nut Haystacks:

40g vegan butter
150g dark brown sugar
40ml unsweetened almond milk
40g cashew butter, all natural – unsweetened and no salt added
70g oats 
60g unsalted cashews, chopped and toasted
2 tsp vanilla extract
tiny pinch of salt


Chocolate Hazelnut Haystacks:

40g vegan butter
150g golden caster sugar (or any type of sugar)
2 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
40ml unsweetened almond milk
40g hazelnut butter, all natural – unsweetened and no salt added
70g oats 
60g unsalted hazelnuts, chopped and toasted
2 tsp vanilla extract
tiny pinch of salt

Both yield about 12 haystacks depending on what size you prefer.

Instructions for either recipe:

Line a chopping board or flat plate with baking or parchment paper and set aside.

In a small frying pan add the chopped cashews/hazelnuts and toast until lightly golden brown.

In a medium sized bowl add the oats, nuts, cashew or hazelnut butter and salt. Don't mix it - just set it aside.

In a small saucepan add the butter, sugar (cocoa powder for the hazelnut version) and milk. Stir and slowly bring to the boil, if it starts to boil before the butter melts then turn the heat down. Keep stirring and once the butter and sugar have melted, turn the heat up to high to bring it to a rolling boil. Once at a rolling boil, stop stirring and let it boil for exactly 1 minute. Now, take it off the heat and give it a good vigorous stir until it is no longer foamy. Add the vanilla and mix well - it will sizzle a bit. 

Scrape it all into the oat mixture and quickly give it a really good mix until the nut butter and everything is very well blended.
Working quickly as these will set pretty fast, take a tablespoon of the mixture and drop them onto the paper lined board/plate. Use another spoon to push them off - not your fingers as the mixture will be VERY hot! .....God I'm such a mom sometimes...

Once they are all on the sheet pop it into the fridge for them to cool and fully set. They set pretty fast, about an hour.

Tip - get some hot water into the saucepan now for easy cleaning :-)

Nutritional Information: per haystack, either recipe (they are more or less the same)

Calories: 148
Protein: 2.4g
Fat: 7.9g
Sat Fat: 1g
Carbs: 18.4g
Sugar: 12.9g
Fibre: 1.8g
Sodium: 157mg

You Might Also Like: (also no-bake!)

Irish Potato Candy
Monkey Squares

Thursday, 12 February 2015

Frangelico Hazelnut Butter Truffles

Frangelico Hazelnut Butter Truffles - vegan recipe
Well, I thought I would sneak in a cheeky little Valentine's Day post for you....although, truth be told - these aren't really truffles! I just didn't know what else to call them :-) Think peanut butter cups but with hazelnut instead and shaped differently (calling them hazelnut butter balls just wasn't going to happen!) I actually made these last year for Easter and shaped them into eggs but I didn't get around to blogging them. So for Valentine's day this year I wanted to make them heart shaped but seriously overestimated my heart shaping abilities....it wasn't working. If you have a silicone heart mould, the type for chocolates or ice cubes, that would be perfect here. Or, just take the easy route and roll them into balls like I did :-)
Frangelico Hazelnut Butter Truffles - vegan recipe
I have based these on my peanut butter cup recipe where I have swapped the peanut butter with hazelnut butter and threw in some delicious Frangelico to fancy them up a bit ;-) They are super easy to throw together and so delicious. As you can see, the chocolate coating is pretty thin so feel free to double coat if you prefer. Furthermore, rolling them in some finely chopped hazelnuts wouldn't go amiss either if that's your thing - play around with them! An almond version with almond butter and Amaretto I'm sure would be great as well. 
Frangelico Hazelnut Butter Truffles - vegan recipe
Frangelico Hazelnut Butter Truffles:

Yields about 28 small "truffles"

¼ cup hazelnut butter (all natural, no salt or sugar)
1 Tbsp vegan butter
pinch of salt
1¼ cups icing sugar
1 Tbsp Frangelico
100g dark chocolate, chopped

Measure the butters into a small bowl and soften with a spoon, mixing well. Add the salt, icing sugar and Frangelico. Mix well until you have a dough. Wrap in cling film and chill for a couple of hours. Roll into small size balls, I used a measured teaspoon, and place on a plate lined with baking paper. Chill in the fridge until firm – a couple of hours will do.

Melt the chopped chocolate in the microwave in 20 second spurts until smooth. Using 2 forks dip the truffles into the chocolate, turning over until well coated. Let the excess chocolate run off then place them on a chopping board lined with baking paper. If you want to roll them in some chopped hazelnuts do this now before the chocolate sets (unless you want to coat them twice, in which case roll them in hazelnuts after the second coating). Chill until set – a couple of hours. If you wish you can coat them again then chill again. Store in the fridge. Lovely with a sip of Frangelico alongside!

Frangelico Hazelnut Butter Truffles - vegan recipe

♥
Nutritional Information: per "truffle"

Calories: 62
Protein: 0.4g
Fat: 2.1g
Sat Fat: 0.2g
Fibre: 0.3g
Carbs: 6.1g
Sugar: 5.3g
Sodium: 1.7mg

Some more Valentine's Day Treats:

Raspberry
White Chocolate
Mousse Cake
Raspberry Bakewell
Tarts



Friday, 18 October 2013

Chocolate + Peanut Butter + Coconut Haystacks

Vegan Chocolate + Peanut Butter + Coconut Haystacks - a no-bake cookie
So, if you follow the daily blog you'll know I've been loving these lately. Haystacks are a 'no-bake' cookie type confectionery that I had often growing up, usually with oats, cocoa, sugar and coconut. They've been around for AGES....there are even versions in a 1950's cookbook I have! To be honest, I forgot all about them until I saw them again on Pinterest but with peanut butter which was a new addition to me and I had to try them.
Vegan Chocolate + Peanut Butter + Coconut Haystacks - a no-bake cookie
Well, the peanut butter was definitely a welcome addition - they were gorgeous, but, I found myself missing the coconut. Haystacks for me must have coconut, SO, I threw some coconut in as well. I also swapped the vegan butter with coconut oil and upped the cocoa powder from the original recipe as I felt it needed it. 

Now, I'm so happy with these, great flavour and nice candy like, almost fudge like texture...and the best thing? They are so quick to whip up!! There have been many days the past couple of weeks I have needed something good, sweet and chocolatey and these have come to the rescue in no time at all. Perfect.


Recipe Notes

• Almost all recipes out there for these call for quick cooking oats. Honestly, I didn't bother and mine turn out fine. I do use Tesco value porridge oats though which have a very small flake which probably does make a difference. If you are not using that brand then you'll probably want to stick with quick cooking oats.
• I've used unsweetened peanut butter, soy milk and coconut here as there is enough sugar in them as is. If you use sweetened versions of those you may want to reduce the sugar a bit.
• If you use vegan butter in place of the coconut oil you can omit the salt.
Vegan Chocolate + Peanut Butter + Coconut Haystacks - a no-bake cookie

Chocolate + Peanut Butter + Coconut Haystacks

• 40g / 2 Tbsp + 2 tsp solid coconut oil (or vegan butter)
• 150g / 2/3 cups white sugar, I used caster
• 40ml / 1.5 fl oz unsweetened soy milk
• 2 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder - measure then sieve so there are no lumps.
• 40g / 2 Tbsp + 2 tsp unsweetened peanut butter
• 70g / ¾ cup oats* see notes above. 
• 20g / ¼ cup unsweetened desiccated coconut
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• tiny pinch of salt

Line a chopping board or flat plate with baking or parchment paper and set aside.

In a medium sized bowl add the oats, coconut, peanut butter and salt. Don't mix it - just set it aside.

In a small saucepan add the coconut oil, sugar, soy milk and cocoa powder. Stir and slowly bring to the boil, if it starts to boil before the coconut oil melts then turn the heat down. Keep stirring and once the oil and sugar have melted, turn the heat up to high to bring it to a rolling boil. Once at a rolling boil, stop stirring and let it boil for exactly 1 minute. Now, take it off the heat and give it a good stir until it is no longer foamy. Add the vanilla and mix well - it will sizzle a bit. Scrape it all into the oat mixture and quickly give it a really good mix until the peanut butter and everything is very well blended.

Working quickly as these will set pretty fast, take a tablespoon of the mixture and drop them onto the paper lined board/plate. Use another spoon to push them off - not your fingers as the mixture will be VERY hot! You should get 9 large haystacks out of this, or 12 smaller ones. Tip - get some hot water into the saucepan now for easy cleaning :-)

Once they are all on the sheet pop it into the fridge for them to cool and fully set. I've not timed this but they do actually set and cool pretty quickly. Usually I keep these in the fridge but they keep out of the fridge just fine too.

Vegan Chocolate + Peanut Butter + Coconut Haystacks - a no-bake cookie

Source: based on Chocolate Oatmeal No-bake Cookies from One More Moore.


Nutritional Information: based on 1 large haystack out of 9

Calories: 199
Protein: 3.6g
Carbs: 27g
Sugar: 17.1g
Fibre: 2.2g
Fat: 9.2g
Sat Fat: 6g
Sodium: 19.1mg

...more no-bake treats:
Bounty/Mounds Bars
Monkey Squares


Thursday, 10 March 2011

Irish Potato Candy

vegan Irish potato candy

A fun treat to make with the kids this St. Patrick's day!

vegan Irish potato candy

A Happy St. Patrick's Day post to you all!! :-) Although I must first explain that there is nothing at all Irish about these. You might be thinking as I live in Ireland these are some sort of traditional sweet. No. I never even heard of them before but came across them online searching for something else entirely. They are a completely American invention but a cute and yummy one at that ;-)

**Edit!** Or so I thought!! The lovely Penny at Scottish Vegan Homemaker mentioned in the comments here she and her husband bought them as kids in Scotland in the 50 and 60's! So.... not American after all, their history is now a mystery!

:-D 

Now, almost every recipe I read for these was different from the others but they all called for a coconut filling. I immediately knew what I would make mine with - my bounty bar recipe filling, for two reasons:

1. It's a sweet coconut filling and
2. Mine actually calls for potato!! Which means of course that my Irish potato candy is made with real Irish potatoes, which is pretty darn cool ;-)

Making these also meant I got to make my bounty bar filling again and take photos of all the steps which I didn't before. They are dead easy but it's nice to see what happens to the potato when you add the sugar. So, here we go:

Irish Potato Candy: makes about 11 small 'new potato' size sweets

2 Tbsp cold mashed potato
120g or 1 cup icing sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla
70g or 3/4 cup desiccated coconut
For coating:
1/2 Tbsp cinnamon
1 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 Tbsp icing sugar

First cook your potato, you will need about 1 medium sized potato, a floury type you would normally use for mash, not a new potato! You can peel it before boiling or after, doesn't matter, just make sure you do NOT salt the water :-) Boil for about 20 minutes or until very soft, drain and return to the pot. Let it sit on low heat about 1 minute to dry it out further then mash well. Set aside to cool or pop it in the fridge if your impatient, it cools down very fast. 
Now you want to push the mash through a fine mesh seive to get it extra smooth as you don't want any little potato bits in this:


Keep pressing it through until it's all out then scrape off the bottom of the seive to get it all out. Give it a good stir till smooth. Now measure out 2 Tbsp of the mash and place in a bowl.


Now the magic happens, actually no, it's not magic, it's purely scientific - add some of the icing sugar and stir well. The potato will almost immediately dissolve into liquid like this:


Keep adding and stirring in the icing sugar until it starts to thicken up like so:


Now add the coconut and stir well...


Keep stirring, how do you think I'm the one people come to when they need a pickle jar opened??


Add more icing sugar and or coconut until it comes together in a ball like so: don't worry if it seems 'loose' - the mixture stiffens up in the fridge later.


Now make your potatoes, I went for randomly shaped little new potatoes, each one there is about a tsp of mixture. Remember these are sweet candy so don't make them too big. If you are making bounty bars out of this just make them little bounty bar shapes instead. That's mounds to my North American friends ;-)


Now mix together the cinnamon, cocoa powder and icing sugar and roll the potatoes generously in this. Also don't worry if this mixture seems a little bitter, the sweetness of the filling counters them quite nicely.


Now if you like pop some pine nuts in for 'eyes' and chill in the fridge for an hour or so then enjoy :-)


Also, those little dirty looking spuds reminded me of a sign at my old favourite farm shop back in England:


Love it!!! :-D


Nutritional Information: 1 'potato' based on making 11
Calories: 111
Fat: 5.5g
Sat Fat: 4.9g
Protein: 0.9g
Sugar: 11.4g
Fibre: 1.7g

♥


Vegan Bounty Bars

Wednesday, 16 December 2009

Snowball Cake Pops

vegan snowball cake popsVegan White Chocolate Coated and dipped in Coconut

vegan snowball cake popsDark Chocolate Coated and dipped in Coconut

vegan cake popsDark Chocolate Coated and dipped in nuts


The inside

How cute are those?!?!?!? Little rum soaked cake balls on a stick, coated in white or dark chocolate and rolled in coconut. Yum! These are another gem from the latest Canadian Living Holiday Baking magazine and as most of the UK is getting some snow today, thought it was a good time to blog them ;) I wanted to make them right away but wasn't sure what to do about the white chocolate. I love organica's vegan white bar but find you can't really bake with it as it melts into oblivion. Thankfully Steven over at Lustrous Musings had the great find of these new vegan white chocolate buttons - cheers! They melt beautifully and re-set really quickly making them perfect in these. Then, after buying out my local Tesco of all they had in them, I still ran out, so decided to coat some in dark chocolate and try different coatings. Here I just went with more coconut and some finely chopped pecans but the possibilities are endless!

Just a note on the cake, I decided to veganize the recipe from the magazine and got lazy and used egg replacers but really, I'm sure any cake recipe you like will work here. I'm kinda kicking myself for not making banana cake for these. Think about it - banana, rum and coconut - that would so work!

Furthermore, these are not just style over substance, they are seriously good!! We all love them and they are so Christmassy, not to mention fun to eat. Think I'll mess about making more food on sticks!

*Recipe says to use apple juice in place of the rum to make alcohol free*

Snowball Cake Pops: recipe says 36, I got about 28

100g / 1/2 cup vegan margarine
170g / 3/4 cup sugar, I used golden caster
40g egg replacer
1 tsp vanilla extract
210g / 1 1/2 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
pinch salt
200 - 300ml rice milk
-----------------------
80ml dark rum (I used Tesco's own label - it's on their vegan list and cheap ;)
vegan white and/or dark chocolate (sorry, didn't measure but you need a lot 350g?)
-desiccated coconut
-finely chopped nuts
-vegan sprinkles (if they exist!)

Cream the butter, sugar and vanilla until light and fluffy. Mix all flour, baking soda, powder and salt together in another bowl. Alternate the milk into the sugar mixture with the dry using 3 dry and 2 liquid until you get a floppy, almost pourable batter. Pour into a baking paper lined 8" square cake tin and bake in a 180C preheated oven for about 30 minutes. It should be golden, bouncy to the touch and a toothpick should come out clean. Leave to cool fully in the pan. I left mine overnight.

Trim the darkened edges off the cake. Eat them. Take the rest of the cake and crumble into a food processor. Drizzle with the rum and process until finely crumbed - it will come together a bit. Using 1 Tbsp at a time roll into a ball and place a popsicle stick inside (I got mine from Hobbycraft).


Place in the fridge to firm up - about 1/2 hour. Melt the chocolate you are going to use and dip the balls in, coating all over and place back on baking paper lined sheets
.

When all coated place back in the fridge to set, about 1/2 hour. Dip them again and immediately roll in whatever coating you like. Place back on the sheets and back in to the fridge for about 1 hour.

If you are giving these as gifts, which they would make super cute foodie gifts - tie a little bow around the stick and place some stryofoam into a gift box. You can then package them standing upright - too cute ;)

Merry Christmas Everyone!!!!!

♥


Monday, 9 November 2009

Mixed Berry and Green Apple Gelees

Berry Gelees

Well I promised lots of vegan sweets from my Canadian Living Holiday Cookbook magazine and these are the first! They are really simple - just fruit, sugar and pectin, fairly easy to make and lovely:) I was just going to direct you to their website for the recipe but I can't find it there, so will post it here. The recipe was easy to follow with one exception. After cooking the fruit you are to purée then push it all through a fine sieve to get 2 cups of purée. This was quite difficult - my arm was killing me and I gave up after getting 1 cup. This meant I was only getting half the mixture so only added half the sugar and pectin listed here. It also meant I had to fill only half an 8" square pan. Thankfully the mixture is so thick this is easy to do - just fill half and shore it up with a strip of baking paper.

Mixed Berry Gelees:
2 large granny smith apples *increase to 4 for the green apple version
3 cups frozen mixed berries *omit for the green apple version
1/2 cup water
2 cups granulated sugar
85g liquid pectin
more granulated sugar to coat

Line bottom and sides of an 8" square pan with baking paper and set aside. Coarsely chop apples, leaving skins and cores but removing seeds. In saucepan cook the apples, water and berries over medium heat until apples are very soft, about 20 minutes. In processor puree the mixture until smooth. Press through fine sieve to get 2 cups* see notes above on this.

In clean saucepan bring the purée with sugar to a boil over medium heat. Boil, stirring often until candy thermometer reaches 'gel point stage' of 218G (103C) or when spoonful cooled on cold plate wrinkles and does not run together when separated, about 20 - 30 minutes. Note, I do not have a candy thermometer and you really do not need one. You'll tell when it's done as it gets thick to the point where a space is left when you stir with a wooden spoon, only slowly coming back together.

Remove from heat and immediately whisk in the pectin. Pour into prepared pan and let stand at room temperature without disturbing for 18 to 24 hours. Turn out onto a cutting board leaving the baking paper underneath. Slice into cubes, remove from paper and toss in the sugar. Let dry for 3 days. You can eat them right away, I think they say this as they do dry up making them easier to pack up for gifts. Store layered between baking paper for up to 2 weeks.

Tuesday, 27 January 2009

Caramel Corn

vegan caramel corn
I've never made caramel corn before, even before being vegan so had no idea how this would work out. I'm pleased to say it was perfect, absolutely delicious and really very easy. They turned out nice and crisp on the outside and not at all sticky or chewy, with great flavour. I am sorry to say that I did use an ingredient that is not readily available here in the UK - corn syrup. I get mine online as I do use it often and feel it really cannot be substituted very well. I have seen others using maple syrup in place of it but I wouldn't recommend golden syrup, it may work in this but I know I tried replacing corn syrup with golden once when making butter tarts and it was an absolute disaster! So, if anyone tries this with replacing the corn syrup please let me know how you fared and I'll update this. Thanks!

4 cups freshly air popped corn
1/4 cup lightly packed brown sugar, I used light muscovado sugar
2 Tbsp vegan margarine
2 Tbsp light corn syrup, I used Karo with added vanilla
1/8 tsp salt
1/8 tsp vanilla
1/8 tsp baking soda

Preheat the oven to 150C and lightly butter a non-stick pan and sides. Place the margarine, sugar, syrup and salt in a saucepan and stir while bringing to the boil. Boil gently for 1 minute without stirring. Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla, then the baking soda - it will foam up here. Tip the popcorn into the pot and gently fold in making sure the corn is covered. Transfer to the greased pan and spread out. Bake for 5 minutes, remove and stir - it should change from being cloudy and foamy to clear and darker. Bake for another 5 minutes where again it should foam up a bit more. Remove and stir again where it will be clear again. Transfer to a large plate and gently seperate with your hands while it cools, being careful of course as it will be hot. (I've got tough hands.) Let cool and serve. We get 3 servings out of this (1 for each of us) so double as you need, it's quite rich so you wouldn't want loads.

Wednesday, 21 January 2009

Bounty Bars

Vegan Bounty or Mounds Bars

Best damn mashed potatoes I've ever had....

Yes, that's right, there is mashed potato in those! Actually I wasn't that surprised when I saw it in the recipe as I've seen other confectionery recipes calling for mash, a truffle recipe if my memory serves me correct. This is of course potatoes not cooked in salt and mashed without milk or butter added, it's not that mad! I had asked K what he really misses and if there was anything I could 'veganize' for him and he immediately chose the dark chocolate bounty bar, or mounds to those of you in North America.

I had a look online and there were recipes calling for cream and butter which would need replacing but this recipe was vegan. I have gotten it from a couple sources, first it comes from the Is that my bureka? blog where he made a fantastic looking lime coconut fudge, but the idea to use that recipe to make homemade bounty bars came from the dinner for one blog. As I scaled this down and made a couple changes I'll post my version here but do go look at those blogs for great step by step photos. I didn't add the lime as I wanted to recreate the bounty bars but am thinking lime in these would be amazing....will do that next time. Oh, and yes, they taste just like bounty bars!!!

Bounty Bars
(makes about 11 depending on what size you want)

2 Tbsp cold mashed potato (you'll need about 1 medium potato)
1 cup icing sugar (more or less)
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 - 1 cup desiccated coconut
75g dark vegan chocolate
1 tsp extra virgin coconut oil - you want this in the solid state

Peel and quarter the potato and boil in unsalted water until ready to mash. Drain and return to the pan on low heat for a couple minutes to dry out slightly. Mash well and let cool. Strain the mashed potato through a fine sieve, pushing it through with a rubber spatula - you don't want any chunks at all in this. Measure out 2 Tbsp of this and place in a bowl. Add the vanilla and about 1/4 cup of the icing sugar and stir well. At this point it gets all scientific and the sugar turns the potato to liquid. I don't know why, I should really look that up! But it's a cool thing to see... then keep adding the icing sugar, 1/4 cup at a time until the mixture turns whiter and thick and fondanty. Stir in the coconut.

**Edit - I used this recipe to make my Irish Potato Candy filling and have step by step photos there! **

Now you should have a ball of mixture that's hard to stir, if not add more icing sugar or coconut as need be. Now in hindsight I could have added less as the texture of a bounty bar isn't quite as dense as mine turned out. The original recipe was for fudge after all, so just keep an eye on it, think of the texture of a bounty and base it on that. When I was happy with it I then greased my hands slightly with the coconut oil and started shaping them into little mounds and placed them on a baking paper lined baking sheet. When done, place in the fridge till cool and set.

For the coating, place the dark chocolate and coconut oil in a bowl set over a pan of simmering water and stir until all melted and glossy. Take the coconut mounds and dip in the chocolate, covering all over and place back on the tray. When all coated pop them back into the fridge until the chocolate sets. Keep in the fridge, but really, they won't last long!

vegan bounty bars

♥

Thursday, 15 January 2009

Single Serve Peanut Butter Cup



♥



Peanut butter cups are dangerous. They taste amazing, are extremely high in fat and calories and are much, much too moreish! I started off making this as just 1 peanut butter cup as I was just testing out the recipe on Joy of Baking  - the recipe there makes 36 mini cups and didn't want to use that much peanut butter if it was a disaster! Then if it turned out I would make and blog the full version.

However, I decided I like the single serve concept here. It makes one large peanut butter cup, about the same calories as a whole chocolate bar so not something you want a lot of in the house, or at least I don't as I wouldn't be able to resist eating loads in a day. But you can of course just click on the link there for the full version if you prefer :-) Furthermore, this is so easy that you can just whip one up for yourself!

Single Serve Peanut Butter Cup:

1/2 Tbsp creamy peanut butter
1/2 tsp vegan margarine
few grains of salt
2 tsp icing sugar
25g dark vegan chocolate
1/4 tsp vegetable oil

I used a paper cupcake liner and cut it down to the size shown, then place the peanut butter, margarine and salt in a bowl and mix well. The recipe said to warm gently in the microwave but as margarine is softer than butter this wasn't necessary. Stir in the icing sugar.

Melt the chocolate in the microwave then stir in the vegetable oil. I then spooned a small amount of chocolate into the liner and swirled it around until all the sides and bottom were coated evenly. In hindsight I should have then placed this in the fridge to set before filling but didn't. As you can see it still worked out but it was tricky getting the much thicker filling to spread over the melted chocolate, if that makes sense.... Anyway, you then spread the filling in then spoon and spread over more chocolate to cover.

Place in fridge until set then peel away the liner. I can't remember how long it was in the fridge for but it wasn't long at all and at that stage was set but still soft enough, I think hours in the fridge might make the chocolate too hard, just check it now and again.

2012 Edit - An easier way if you are just making this for yourself and have no need to go for the classic peanut butter cup shape is to simply spread about half the melted chocolate onto baking paper, shape the peanut butter mixture to a flat ball and place on the chocolate then pour the rest of the melted chocolate over top and chill to set. I *needed* mine quick and first popped it in the freezer for about 1/2 hour then in the fridge for 15 minutes and it was perfect.

♥
 
Nutritional Information: for 1 large individual 'cup'

Calories: 213
Fat: 14g
Sat Fat: 6.3g
Protein: 2.8g
Fibre: 2.6g
Carbs: 19g
Sugar: 17.7g
Sodium: 38.8mg

♥