I promised I'd be back in a couple days, didn't I? oops! Well, I know Keyera for one is super anxious to start making these herself so she can quit relying on John to bring them in his lunch so lets get started on the Almond Joy bites. Here's what you need:
I buy big jars of coconut oil here.
The coconut manna (or coconut butter) is here.
I buy the unsweetened shredded coconut by the 12 bag case.
The dark chocolate I buy by the 5 lb bag.
Raw almonds in the bulk section at the grocery store.
Sweetleaf Stevia drops I usually buy several different flavors at a time here but if you're trying to keep it all in one order get them here.
I think I mentioned last time, use a good quality vanilla extract. I'm always scouting Ross, TJ Maxx, Home Goods, etc in their kitchen dept for just such items.
This is the mold I use. I bought all 7 that were on the rack last time I checked JoAnn's. They're also at Michael's I think.
Well! Now you know why I put off the directions so long. It's not just some stuff you grab at Safeway, right? And yes you probably can find a lot of those ingredients at the health food store but they are way more expensive than Amazon. Anyway...the rest you could probably figure out yourself but I have come up with a couple of time savers so I'll proceed.
I don't measure, but I'd say about 1 cup of oil to 1/3 cup of manna. I threw out my microwave (could no longer ignore that I was 'nuking' food) but you can use whatever to melt it. While it is melting I am beginning the assembly line process.
1/2 tsp of shredded coconut in each cup.
One almond in each cup.
Once the oil is melted, remove from heat and add a good Tbsp of vanilla, and app 1 drop of Stevia per fluid ounce of oil. Now here's my first time saving tip:
Yeah baby! I don't even want to tell you how many times I filled each little cup by hand before I thought of this. Get a ketchup bottle from the dollar or grocery store and you're off!
My more recent 'big idea' was to send the chocolate drops through the food processor, thus saving a couple of steps. It's somewhat messy and the end product isn't quite as pretty, but of course; they taste the same!
Now you get to clean out (or at least, rearrange) the freezer because that's where all these trays need to go. For maybe 15 minutes. Then they all just pop out of the molds.
Voila!
The ones on the right are the way I've been making them until now. First you would put them in the freezer without any chocolate. Melt the chocolate (double boiler style if not using a microwave), then spread a little bit on top of each candy and freeze again. I store them in the fridge. Coconut oil melts at around 76 degrees.
Either way, they are really good and good FOR you too, believe it or not. In fact, when we have a couple of these with a glass of red wine after dinner we say "we're taking our medicine"!
Let me know if you have any questions and how it works out for you.
PS: If you have any leftover melted oil, just pour into a container, freeze it, pop it out and store in the freezer in a baggie til next time you make them. It'll be your 'starter'. ;-)
I haven't read my blogs in so long, then I scrolled down to read this entry. I love the recipe. I've been eating Paleo for 4 weeks and this fits right in. Do you eat Paleo/Primal? I'd be interested in more of your recipes. Thanks for your blog!
mimi h
Posted by: Mimi Hildebrandt | November 28, 2011 at 06:42 PM