Dessert

Medicinal Mushroom Chocolates

This Valentine's Day, we decided to dive into the love story between cacao, the Food of the Gods, and mushrooms, the Flesh of the Gods. Read our blog post here, to learn more about their ancient healing history and how these two foods were honoured and made sacred.

The process of tempering chocolate helps the chocolate to set up firmly so it will snap when bitten into or broken. This process will also help give the final product a glossy sheen and bring out the flavours. It's a bit more labour intensive but we love the end product.

Ingredients

1/2 cup cacao powder
3/4 cup cacao butter, melted
1/4 cup Forest Juice maple syrup
10 ml 11:11 tincture, optional
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp cinnamon
Pinch of cayenne
Pinch of salt

Tools

Chocolate Molds (unless you are making a bark, which you could lay flat on a baking sheet)
Food thermometer
Saucepan and mixing bowl to create double boiler

Directions

Wash and dry any molds you will use for your chocolates
Prepare your double boiler: fill a saucepan with water, less than halfway full, and place on the stove on high until it starts to boil. Find a dry mixing bowl and place over the saucepan once the water is boiling. The water should not be hitting the top of the mixing bowl and it should be only the steam that is heating the mixing bowl
Place cacao butter and cacao powder in a clean, dry bowl over the heat source to melt
Remember the bowl of cacao should not be directly touching the heat, but rather be suspended above hot water, to be gradually melted by the steam
Stir cacao butter and powder with a whisk
As the cacao butter and paste melt together, take the temperature of the melted paste. Bring the temperature up to 115° (46° celsius)
Immediately remove bowl from hot water source once at this temperature
Continue to stir. You can add a solid piece of cacao butter or a bit more cacao powder to the melted mixture to cool it down
Add all other ingredients
Cool down to 84° (29° celsius)
Once the mixture has reached 84° (29° celsius) return mixture to the double boiler
Heat mixture back up to 88° (31° celsius) and immediately remove from heat. At 88 degrees, the chocolate is in temper and will yield the best result
Pour chocolate mixture into your molds, allow to sit and become solid, either at room temperature or by placing molds in fridge