Satisfying a Serious Chocolate Addiction

In general, I usually suffer from a serious chocolate addiction.  It is even worse when I am putting in a high mileage week with my running.  It's funny, because back in high school and college I didn't really love chocolate all that much.  Since I've been married though, everything has changed.  I usually try to keep my chocolate consumption to a minimum, and when I make desserts, I try to pick ones with no added oils or processed junk

I love the Trader Joes Vegan Dark Chocolate bars, and always stock up on them whenever I can.  The only real problem with these is that they violate one of my food rules, don't eat anything with ingredients that you cannot pronounce. 

Yesterday, after a seven mile run, I was, again, craving chocolate.  I was searching through some recipes on my favorite vegan blog, the FatFree Vegan Kitchen, and I came across these beauties.

*drool*

I knew I had to try them!  It took only about 10 minutes to get the "dough" in the fridge, where it stayed until after dinner.  After we cleaned the kitchen, I rolled the nuggets, and drew on the chocolate curls.  It was fun, and John's first words when he came over to view my work was, "Those are so pretty!"  The recipe made 24 nuggets, and we ate about half of them between the two of us.  They really do taste like Almond Joy without all the processed junk!  One of the best desserts I've ever made, and so fun too!

A few notes on the preparation.  I had to add a few tablespoons of water to the food processor to make the dates blend with the coconut and cocoa.  The dates don't have to be completely mushed up, but they do have to be about 90% there.  My husband said he would have preferred to roll them in more powdered sugar and a little less cocoa, because he thought the amount of bitter chocolate threw off the sweetnesss of the dates.  I happen to love bitter chocolate, so it really depends on your own taste preferences!  Ghirardelli makes a great vegan chocolate chip, and that was the only dairy-free brand that was available at my local Safeway.  It melted really well and piped on like a dream!  I used a ziploc bag with the corner snipped off to do the piping.  So fun!

Here is the recipe!!

Chocolate-Almond Nuggets of Joy

I hope you enjoy these as much as we did!