Baking · Chocolate · Do-ahead · Gluten Free · Nuts

Easy, healthy homemade fruit, nut and seed chocolate

This is the most divine chocolate you can eat, and you choose exactly what you want in it and how dark the chocolate is. Everyone swoons with this chocolate.

It almost doesn’t need a recipe so I will give you the guidelines;

This makes about 40 pieces, at least

You will need;

A double boiler, or a bowl to sit on top of a saucepan without the bottom of it touching the water you put in the saucepan.
A shallow 9” by 13” baking tray lined with aluminum foil (however, you can make as little or as much as you want and vary the size of the tray.

Ingredients

12 x 4oz bars of really good quality chocolate. I use Lindt and use 8 x 85% bars and 4  x 70% bars, sometimes using a couple of the “Lindt Intense orange” flavor, or “mint” flavor but you can put in anything you want.

Salted, skinned peanuts (It’s nice to have something salted against the sweetness of the chocolate)
pumpkin seeds
pistachio nuts
sunflower seeds
toasted slivered almonds
any other nuts you like, chopped very coarsely
raisins
dried cranberries
dried blueberries
dried apricots
crystallized ginger
any other dried fruit

2 fresh oranges, grated zest only (if you like a lovely orange flavor)

Method

You can really improvise with this, but all you do is break up the chocolate and put it in the top bowl of a double boiler.

Cut all the nuts until they are pretty similar in size and sprinkle all the fruits, nuts and seeds of your choice onto the lined baking tray.

Finely grate the zest of the two oranges and add to the chocolate in the bowl over medium heat so the water underneath is gently simmering. Stir occasionally until it has all melted.
Take off the stove and pour over all the fruits, nuts and seeds in the baking tray, shaking the baking tray so it spreads evenly into all the holes and crevices. Sprinkle a few bits and pieces of the fruit, nuts and seeds over the top for decoration and then refrigerate for 4 to 6 hours until set.

Remove the foil from underneath the chocolate, and start cutting it into chunks . Store in a container in the fridge and you will have divine chocolate for weeks!!