Homemade - sugar free chocolate

I ate way too much chocolate over Christmas. By the time I'd eaten some tree chocolates, the box of Belgian shells my in laws always buy me and helped my Husbeast with his selection box off his parents I had a monster headache which started on Sunday and still hasn't gone away.

I haven't had a headache like this for a year or so now and I think its probably been brought at least in part by sugar. After all there wasn't just the chocolate, there was cake, mince pies, Christmas pudding...

I don't think we have a particularly sugary Christmas compared to some, but this was the first time I iced my Christmas cake which wont have helped.

The trouble is I love chocolate and I know any resolutions I make to stop eating it will never last. I easily go months without eating crisps, biscuits, cake etc but chocolate and cheese are my downfall.

So yesterday I tried to make some sugar free chocolate, the recipe does have honey in it as a natural sweetener but I know from experience my body can handle honey better than sugar.

Coconut chocolate

150g of coconut oil

150g of cocoa powder
150g of honey
2-3 drops of vanilla extract (optional)

Put the coconut oil into a glass mixing bowl and balance it over a bowl of just boiled water. Stir until it in fully dissolved. Then add the other ingredients and whisk until smooth and glossy.

Pour the mixture into moulds and put into the freezer to set. Apparently this should take 2-3 hours, I know I had a look after about 4 and they were fully set.

This chocolate needs to be kept in the freezer to keep it solid. I made it in a silicon muffin mould and it filled six moulds. I think this is too big a quantity as the mixture is quite rich.

The chocolate is still soft despite being frozen and I would imagine it would end up a sticky mess if it was left out of the freezer for too long.

It is very sweet, more like milk chocolate for sweetness levels than dark chocolate as I'd imagined it to be. Although the taste underneath that is more dark than milk. Personally I think I could reduce the amount of honey in the recipe as it asks for a lot, so for my next batch I will try cutting down and see how it works. If it does work with less honey it will also work out a lot cheaper.

I think I'm going to try and get hold of some silicone ice cube moulds, or something smaller. I think an ice cube sized piece of this whenever I get a sweet craving could work very well.

It can of course be customised to your favourite chocolate tastes. The vanilla extract could be swapped for mint or orange. You could add raisins or nuts etc. Its quite a versatile recipe. I fancy having a little bag of these in the freezer in lots of different flavours so that I get a lucky dip when I eat one. 

Update on the deodorant: I spent the day at work today in our sauna of an office (my boss likes the heat turned up really high) and I don't feel sticky or sweaty at all.

I did do a half hour workout when I got home and I felt a little sticky after that, the only smell was of mild coconut though and I just applied some more of the mixture and felt fine after.


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