(Along with golden syrup and blackstrap molasses?)

And you know how pecans are the greatest?

(Along with almonds and cashews and pistachios?)

And you know how homemade nut butters are the greatest?

(Along with puppies? Yeah, there was no connection with that one.)

And you know how Sarah is the greatest housemate?

(I lost the rhythm a bit there.)

Well, I made Sarah a batch of Homemade Maple Pecan Butter before I left Toronto, and it was the greatest.

So great, in fact, that we were at risk of eating all the maple-roasted pecans straight from the tray before turning them into nut butter.

And so great that, once turned into nut butter, the entire batch disappeared in little more than the blink of an eye.

This nut butter is ridiculously easy and quick to make, as the high (good-for-you!) oil content of pecans means they butterise (shhh, spellcheck, let’s pretend that’s a word) more swiftly than do almonds or cashews.

Go forth and make this incredible roasted maple pecan nut butter, my friends.

Because this world is the greatest.

Alayna recently published her first cookbook, The Japanese Pantry, which showcases approachable yet dinner party-worthy Japanese (and Japanese-inspired) recipes. Believe you me, Alayna’s recipes look, sound, and taste as good as many of the dishes I ate in Japan several years ago.

When Alayna offered me a copy of her cookbook, I was breathless with gratitude and joy. A few weeks later, I moved beyond “breathless” to “squealing” because, along with her cookbook, Alayna sent me the dazzling array of goodies you see above.

Alayna, you are a wonder and a song. This is your chocolatepalooza post. Thank you.

Raw Shakti Chocolate 85% Cacao

A part of me is tempted to repeat the words on the Raw Shakti Chocolate package then proclaim “voila! My review!” After all, Shakti proclaims that its chocolate is: 85% cacao, raw, stoneground, handcrafted, sustainable, [made from] single origin Ecuador[ian cacao], [using] all organic ingredients, [and has] deep fruity notes with a complex floral finish.

Need I say more?

Perhaps not, but I will anyway. This Raw Shakti 85% vegan dark chocolate had one of the crispest snaps I’ve ever encountered in raw chocolate, as well as an unwavering aroma of twangy redcurrant and unripe plum mixed with bitter raw cacao.

The taste followed suit with red fruit acidity, but thankfully not in a puckeringly sour way. The flavour was strong in tannins, merlot, lemon, and (again) unripe plums, but it also had notes of cigarette ash and the coolness of underground caves. Yes, I just said this chocolate tastes like caves.

I’d like to see that appear in the marketing blurb one day.

Justin’s All-Natural Milk Chocolate Peanut Candy Bar

Have you ever wanted a Snickers bar but not its plethora of dodgy ingredients? Well, Justin’s has your back. Justin’s All-Natural Milk Chocolate Peanut Candy Bar is comprised of milk chocolate, peanuts, caramel, and nougat, but no hydrogenated oils or multisyllabic chemical components. Just pronounceable nuts, sugar, and chocolate.

The caramel was firmer than is found in a Mars Bar or Snickers, and had a lighter sweetness too. The nougat was malty and the peanuts well-roasted, balancing the sweetness of the caramel and milk chocolate. At times, the overall texture and flavour reminded me of fudge.

I want Justin’s (vegan) Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups now.

Madécasse Pink Pepper and Citrus

I saved the best for last! Having previously tried and loved Madécasse, I was supremely excited about this mini bar of Madécasse Pink Pepper and Citrus 63% Dark Chocolate. The citrus refers to combava fruit, also known as kaffir lime.

This bar was wonderful. Alayna, you’re wonderful.

The aroma was so strong, so chocolatey, so tangy (in a gorgeously fruity way). As is always the case, Madécasse exemplified perfect tempering in this bar, with a beautiful crack-snap ringing out each time I broke off a square.

The flavour was light yet strong, by which I mean that the lime notes were ever-present but not overpowering. The citrus was like a cloud of perfume dancing through the vanilla-scented heady cacao notes of the 63% chocolate, while the pink pepper added just the barest hint of a savoury twist, broadening and deepening the bar’s overall flavour.

Oh Madécasse. I like you almost as much as I like Alayna.

Never.

Not if Bieber’s watching my every move.

Maybe.

(The Butterfinger Bites, if you’re offering, Rocket Fizz.)

Indubitably.

(American-style iced coffee > Australian-style iced coffee.)

Shhhh. I know. You don’t need to tell me.

Won’t repeat.

(My gluten-free dairy-free poppy seed cake is better. Probably because I use sugar.)

Will repeat.

(Happiness is freshly-baked snickerdoodle cookies.)

Recipe here.

Heel click,
Hannah

I miss primary school fêtes. I miss how the schoolyard looked and felt different when visited on the weekend in the sunshine, how the tables in the quadrangle adorned with homemade treats or “trash and treasure” seemed more alluring than any shopping mall ever could, and how much fun it was to run around wildly with friends without having to worry about a teacher yelling at us for going out of bounds.

I miss putting so much tomato sauce onto my sausage sizzle sausage that the flimsy white bread beneath grew soggy (but tangy!), and I miss buying a toffee cup for ten cents; I miss those toffee cups in muffin cases that were nothing more than caster sugar, water, and food colouring boiled together into discs then topped with sprinkles, ready to be sucked on for hours (or until accidentally dropped it in the dirt while playing tag).

There would always be at least one plate of coconut ice on the tables selling homemade goodies. A uniquely Australian treat, coconut ice is traditionally a pink and white layered confection made from coconut, copha, red food colouring, and either sweetened condensed milk or icing sugar and egg white.

Coconut ice is sweet, so sweet, and pretty, so pretty, and coconutty, so coconutty.

A few months ago, I remembered the existence of coconut ice and could suddenly think of naught but veganising it with the help of my enormous jar of coconut oil. In a vague nod towards being a Grown-Up rather than an seven-year-old girl with a sticky disc of half-licked toffee in her hand, I replaced the food colouring with cocoa powder and took the resulting gluten-free, dairy-free, definitely-not-sugar-free treat into work.

My colleagues may not have the same school fête memory associations with this vegan chocolate coconut ice as I do, but they seemed to love eating it all the same.

Submitted to Healthy Vegan Friday, Allergy-Friendly Lunchbox Love and 5 Ingredient Monday.

(I may or may not have eaten an unseemly amount of ice cream immediately prior to writing this post. Face face face.)

See? It’s such a great face, Sarah’s face. It is one of my favourite faces to see across the table at Fresh, the vegan and gluten-free-friendly restaurant I’ve previously posted about here and here.

Before I left Toronto, Sarah and I made a point of setting aside a few weekend days for Outside The House Adventures and, each time, we started said adventures with brunch or lunch at the Fresh closest to our house.

The juices are lovely, and the coffees can be made with almond milk. At our first brunch, Sarah and I sat at the bar ogling the enormous carrots and mountains of bananas wielded by Fresh’s juice chefs (juiceisters? juicetenders? juiceologists?), before diving into our delicious plates of goodness.

Sarah ordered from the gluten allergy friendly menu, opting for the blueberry pancakes with scrambled tofu and tempeh bacon. It hurt my heart that the pancakes arrived topped with the devilfruit, but perhaps this was a deliberate ploy to prevent me from stealing all the pancakes. All of them.

I chose one of Fresh’s big bowls of vegetables and grains (I asked for extra kale, which came after this photo was taken), and delighted in every bite.

What is a meal without dessert? Fresh stocks desserts by Sweets From The Earth, and I took a gamble on the Gluten-Free Walnut Brownie.

Eaten later while watching Departures with Sarah, the brownie had a great mix of crispy-outside and fudgy-inside, with the walnuts balancing the sweetness of each bite.

A few days before I left for the U.S., Sarah and I returned for a last meal at Fresh. As glorious as the red lentil, tomato, and fennel soup, grilled cornbread, hummus, and superfood salad were, no food could compare to the joy of sitting on a patio on a sunny spring day after six months of brutally cold weather…

…with that face.

Maybe today’s chocolates don’t need to be written about. But, then again, I don’t necessarily want to only post about hard-to-find, expensive, artisanal, and/or fancypants treats, because heaven knows that neither money nor chocolate grows on trees. (Well, cacao pods do…)

Aaaaaand I just managed to drip pistachio gelato down my top. That may’ve been the universe telling me to stop complaining about having a surfeit of treats. Message received, universe. Message received.

Starbucks Caramel Brûlé Chocolate Bites

Firstly, Starbucks spelled “brûlé” in a way I’d never seen before, but Janet has informed me that it is, indeed, correct. Go you good thing, bilingual country!

Secondly, Starbucks spelled “natural” incorrectly. Unless “natrual flavours” are something new and exciting in the chocolate world?

Thirdly, these “milk and dark chocolate surrounding a rich, creamy caramel” bites were pretty in a dappled way, with a caramel ice cream aroma.

Fourthly, the chocolate coating melted easily and the caramel inside was chewy, but initially completely lacked flavour.

Fifthly, no, I really mean that; I spent the first few seconds of every bite wondering why I could taste nothing despite knowing something was in my mouth.

Sixthly, a mild sweetness did emerge after a few chews, reminding me of Werther’s caramels with hints of butteriness.

Seventhly, these were disappointing and I wouldn’t buy them again. Actually, I wouldn’t even eat them again if offered for free. Life is too short to waste on chocolate that tastes predominantly of nothing.

Pretzel M&M’s

Larger than original M&M’s but far lighter when it comes to throwing and catching in one’s mouth, these Pretzel M&M’s were incredibly easy to eat.

The crackly sugar coating gave way to a thin layer of milk chocolate, together tasting like M&M’s. Yes, saying that is redundant, but what can I do? M&M’s have a particular taste, and thus M&M’s have a particular taste.

Beneath the chocolate lurked firm little nuggets of crunchy salty pretzel, thereby creating a fun salty-sweet-sugary-chocolatey-malty-toasty taste.

I hope peanut-butter-pretzel M&M’s are brought into existence next.

Cadbury Crispy Crunch

I’ve been craving Chick-O-Sticks like a fiend for months now.

Butterfingers are like Chick-O-Sticks covered in mockolate.

Cadbury Crispy Crunch(es) seem to be a Canadian version of Butterfingers.

Ergo I had to buy this candy bar.

With an aroma like roasted peanuts, then peanut brittle, then just a hint of sweet cocoa, I had high hopes for the peanutiness of this Cadbury Crispy Crunch bar.

It broke crisply, firmly, with the same peanut brittle-esque layers as inside a Butterfinger bar but less flaky, more solid.

Each bite was a tasty wallop of salt, caramel/burnt caramel, honeycomb, salted roasted peanuts, peanut butter, peanut brittle, nondescript unimportant milky chocolate, toffee sweetness, again salt, again roasted peanuts, again peanut brittle.

I want a Chick-O-Stick even more now.

Welcome. Would you like a slab of salted caramel brownie?

We could also call this treat by a more long-winded, swankypants, and technically correct name: Fleur de Sel Caramel-Swirled Brownies.

Or maybe: David Lebovitz’ Deep Dark Rich Brownies with Trader Joe’s Fleur de Sel Caramel Sauce.

Or else: Just Seriously So Good You Need To Make These Right Now Brownies.

I mean, look at that. Look at how the caramel sauce swirled into the batter turns into pretty crevices and canyons of burnished sea salt-kissed deeply-buttery dulce de leche nestled into soft, moist, heady chocolatey goodness.

Look at how the brownies firm up in the fridge overnight to become dense squares of intense richness hiding a layer of salted caramel within as well as on top. Look, imagine, dream, make.

Make these for someone you love. For people you love. Perhaps for the wonderful people who are letting you stay with them in Southern California for a few weeks, who are catering to both your sweet tooth with endless pints of Ben and Jerry’s and your love of vegetables with 3lb bags of broccoli. For the people whose sunny backyard you’re lying down in every afternoon until the heat sears into your skin and soul, for the people whose couch you’re curling up in every morning to drink coffee and write poetry, for the people whose kindness and care is making you feel so very much at home (-away-from-home).

Make these to say thank you. Make these to say I’m happy. Make these just because.

I followed David Lebovitz’ recipe for dulce de leche brownies to make these Salted Caramel Brownies/Fleur de Sel Caramel-Swirled Brownies, using Baker’s semi-sweet chocolate and Trader Joe’s Fleur de Sel Caramel Sauce. I recommend you do the same.

Of course right. It’s the contrasts that make this world of ours so eminently fascinating.

Zimt Artisan Chocolates

Last year, back when I was still in Australia, I was contacted by the passionate and charming Emma, founder of Zimt Artisan Chocolates. Zimt chocolate is fair trade, organic, raw, vegan, sustainable, hand-made in micro batches, packaged in recycled and compostable materials and, most importantly of all, delicious – but I’m getting ahead of myself.

After several months of emailing back and forth while I travelled and Emma redesigned her packaging, I received a lovely note and selection of chocolates direct from Vancouver. Emma uses high quality cacao along with coconut nectar and coconut sugar for her chocolate, thereby creating a deep, dark, and rich base for her growing line.

Zimt Artisan Chocolates Chocolate Nib’d

I started with the most purely-cacao-focused of Emma’s bars, the Raw Chocolate Nib’d. Described as “rich dark chocolate studded with crunchy cacao bean nibs”, the bar was firm (if not as crisp as tempered, non-raw chocolate) with an enticingly deep aroma.

From my first nibble to my last bite, I enjoyed this bar’s flavours of redcurrant, melted butter on toast (oops; that’s not a very vegan description), liqueur, toffee flavoured with pear (oops; that doesn’t exist in real life), and even a little light champagne. I’m also always a fan of cacao nibs in chocolate.

Zimt Artisan Chocolates  Sweet Orange Nib’d

Okay, you all know that I couldn’t eat this devilfruit-focused chocolate. I wish I could have; it looked so glossy and enticing. I even went so far as to pick up a square, but alas! My soul couldn’t do it. I simply can’t have anything to do with orange chocolate.

However, I have it on good authority (i.e. a friend) that this bar is highly enjoyable if you’re someone who enjoys orange and chocolate together. Plus, it’s pretty to look at, yeah?

Zimt Artisan Chocolates Coconut Crisp

Deep breath now. Deep breath in. Mmm. Cleansing seductive breaths, for “rich dark chocolate and crispy flaked coconut” is a far more welcome citizen in my chocolate world. Wait… a citizen that I eat? That wasn’t a very good metaphor.

Moving on.

The aroma of Zimt Coconut Crisp was like the Golden Rough chocolates I ate in childhood, but deeper, darker, and headier with a tangy raspberry-esque twist. The coconut generously mixed through the chocolate contributed a lovely crunch to each bite, and the overall taste was dark yet mellow, whispering with soft sweetness and humming with coconut.

I really enjoyed the Zimt flavours I tried, and was glad to share the other with an appreciative audience. A big thank you to Emma for her generosity, and I can’t wait to see Zimt take Canada (and the world) by storm.

I touched down in California on Friday afternoon amidst glorious sweltering heat (after transiting through a blizzard in Minneapolis-Saint Paul), and was picked up at the airport by the family friends I’m currently staying with. Our families became friends when I lived in Orange County as a kid, and we’ve stayed in touch throughout the twenty years since.

As soon as I hugged C and E hello at baggage claim (and near collapsed laughing when C handed over the caffeine-free coke she’d brought along for me [oops, sorry; don’t you hate inside jokes?]), I experienced a magical sense of instant camaraderie and comfort that made me feel I was home (and somehow closer to my own family, too).

It was this sense of comfort that enabled me to voice the secret desire that has been building in my heart ever since I studied at the University of Virginia in 2007-8:

I wanted to go to The Cheesecake Factory. I wanted to experience one of the most American of insane American desserts.

Standing before the cheesecake display case at The Cheesecake Factory, my heart started thrumming with excitement and I may or may not have squeaked out “it’s too much! I want it all! I can’t decide! It’s too much!” over and over.

Ultimate Red Velvet Cake Cheesecake. Pina Colada Cake Cheesecake. Dutch Apple Caramel Cheesecake. Chocolate Tuxedo Cream Cheesecake. Craig’s Crazy Carrot Cake Cheesecake. Wild Blueberry White Chocolate Cheesecake.

I couldn’t decide.

So C bought me two slices. She’s such a gem.

On the left, we have the most epically epic candy-peanut-butter-chocolate cheesecake of all time. On the right, a straight-up New York baked cheesecake.

The Cheesecake Factory’s Original Cheesecake with its graham cracker crust was exactly the dense yet fluffy, tangy yet sweet, heavy yet light cheesecake I find myself craving on a semi-regular basis. I even liked the crust (which I normally have no interest in).

E ordered the Reese’s Peanut Butter Chocolate Cake Cheesecake, kindly having agreed not to get the exact same slice as me (below). Her peanut butter-y choice involved layers of chocolate fudge cake, caramel, and peanut butter cup-filled cheesecake, topped and garnished with more chocolate.

I couldn’t resist the Adam’s Peanut Butter Cup Fudge Ripple Cheesecake, described as “Creamy Cheesecake Swirled with Caramel, Peanut Butter, Butterfingers® and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups®”.

I just can’t even. I just can’t even.

Everything went quiet when I took my first bite. It was beyond. Rich, rich, sweet (yet not cloying due to the saltiness of the peanut butter), rich, heavenly, dense, chunks of crispy Butterfingers and smooth Reese’s, caramel sauce and chocolate drizzles abounding, a hefty dollop of peanut butter frosting that I thought I’d push away (I’m no buttercream fan) but ended up mainlining because it tasted almost like straight peanut butter… I just can’t even. ‘Murcah!

With one third remaining of the mammoth slice (it looks smaller here than it was), I walked over to the fridge to save the rest for the next day. Half an hour later, I gave in to the siren call and pulled it out again.

I mean, really, what’s the point of my having spent years training by eating half-jars of peanut butter in one sitting if I can’t finish a(n admittedly insanely rich) cheesecake behemoth in one night?

Exactly.

I am such a happy lady right now.

I think I’ve found my arch-nemesis. She is sitting next to me right now. For the past three hours, I’ve been flinching instinctively away from her knitting needles as they fly at my eyes, and she’s been giving me sidelong glares as I steadily munch my way through an entire block of Lindt 90%, a muffin, a bag of carrots and sugar snap peas, three cookies, and quite a few ginger chews to boot.

With that off my chest, why don’t we take a last (for now) look at some of the Canadian snacks I’ve had the [mis]fortune of eating lately?

I’m not sure why, being ambivalent towards coconut, I bought Nature’s Path Organic Coconut Chia Granola. It may have had something to do with the words “new” and “chia”.

The granola was pleasant, and proved even tastier when mixed with cacao nibs, but I still like my homemade granolas better.

The brilliant Kristy gave me a packet of dropjes from Amsterdam a few months ago, and, as someone who hated licorice until trying licorice gelato in Florence, I found my mind blown by the perplexingly delicious salty-sweet-anise flavour of the salted licorice bites.

WE WILL NEVER SPEAK OF THESE AGAIN.

The wonderful M, whose room I’ve been subletting, returned to Toronto in March with a plethora of South American goodies. I couldn’t read the packaging of these Pacoquitas…

…but golly, they were good. Made from peanuts and sugar, they were so delicate, so crumbly-melt-in-the-mouth, so peanutty-sweet, so good.

I saw these Spring Cookies in Loblaws a few weeks ago. I didn’t buy them out of protest because it was still snowing that day.

Peanut Butter Cheerios taste even better when they’re in French. (Also, I meant to make rice krispie treats with these, but I got distracted by eating them by the handful.)

Mea culpa.

I’d been suffering a mega-cheesecake craving for months, a craving for the densest, tangiest, sticks-to-the-roof-of-your-mouth New York baked cheesecake, for months.

So, in December, I bought myself a entire frozen cheesecake from a No Frills store.

It wasn’t very good. It made my lactard soul hurt.

But I ate the whole thing anyway, because that’s what you do when you’re on a budget and you stupidly “splurge” on an entire frozen cheesecake.

Criminey! I swear the needle almost got me that time. If the next time you see me I’m wearing an eye-patch like a pirate, you’ll know why.