Pots of Chocolate Gold

I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentine's Day? I was joking around with the kids and friends on Sunday morning as everyone had a Valentine's Day hangover from chocolate, wine and love ;-) ... thankfully that holiday only comes around once a year, right!!

Any way.

I had this recipe tagged in my cookbook since Christmas morning ... and then I got the weekly email update from Michelle and said, heck, I should try this ... so I rooted around in my chocolate stash and had exactly 6 1.2 ounce bars of bittersweet 72% cocoa bars ... score! That made everything I needed available in house which made me decide that I needed to make it right then and there!!

The original recipe is in the cookbook ... and also on the website. And of course, as always, I modified to suit my needs and what we had on hand!

It was a little time consuming in the beginning ... I stirred and stirred and stirred for 45 minutes til my sauce was thick ... uggg. I was worried about heating the mixture TOO quickly and had the heat set a tad too low and the mixture was not heating up at all ;-) .... so medium low heat is NOT low heat ... just saying!

Ok, here's what I used to make these little Pots of Chocolate Gold ...

1 can of lite coconut milk. CAN, not carton.
2 large egg yolks
1/4 tsp chili powder
1/8 tsp salt
cinnamon stick
7 ounces dark chocolate (make sure its a minimum of 70% cocoa)
1 tbs vanilla
whipped cream and cinnamon for garnish (if you want to stay dairy free, you can make coconut whipped cream, Michelle has a recipe on her site...I opted for regular since I had whipping cream and no full fat coconut milk)

Take your chocolate bars and cut them up. Well, actually, slice them thinly. You don't want big chunks because we are going to attempt to melt the chocolate without having to stir too much ... you'll see what I mean soon enough. Take my advice and put the cut/sliced chocolate in a 4 cup or larger glass measuring cup, top the glass/bowl with a fine mesh strainer and set aside.

Whisk the coconut milk, egg yolks, salt, cinnamon stick and chili powder in saucepan to mix well.  Turn heat on to medium low. Not medium, not low. Medium low.

Grab your wooden spoon and start stirring. And stirring. And stirring. This should really only take about 15 minutes, give or take 5.  You want to stir until the yolks have cooked and the coconut milk has thickened enough to coat the back of your wooden spoon. Heat it too quickly and you will have scrambled eggs and lumpy coconut milk, so slow and steady is the gameplan, ok?

Once you've reached the right consistency, remove the pan from the heat and grab a mesh strainer and place that over chocolate bowl. Pour the mixture through the strainer, shake out and toss the cinnamon stick and go throw a load of laundry in the dryer.

You need to leave the stuff alone so the hot mixture can melt the chocolate, undisturbed. Honestly, I kept looking at it and wanted to poke around to speed it up a little, or just mix it up ... just. because. So, go ahead, walk out of the kitchen and take care of some non kitchen chore ....

So. When 10 minutes have gone by, come on back to the kitchen. Grab a rubber spatula and stir gently, almost as if you are folding the ingredients together. You want to be gentle so as not to chill the mixture too quickly as you want all that good chocolaty stuff to melt and incorporate with the cream mixture.  Once it's all stirred together, stir in your vanilla.

Here's where you will be thankful if followed my lead and used a 4 cup glass measuring glass to put your chocolate in.

Take 6 2 ounce jars or cups (I used some cute little canning jars) and pour the mixture slowly in to each jar.  Allow to cool and then cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate 4 hours or so.

When ready to serve, whip up a quick batch of whipped cream (just a little cream and a dash of sugar whipped with a hand mixer), top the chocolate with a little whipped cream and sprinkle with cinnamon.

Yummm. This is super rich but O M G, delicious!!!!  I could easily make this EVERY WEEKEND but that would become like some other things where we become obsessive and over do it ... so ... special treat only ... like Easter (6 weeks or so?), my birthday (3 months maybe?)  ... or, Mother's Day ...

Looking forward to sharing with some of these great parties ... make sure you check them out! Instagram Blog Hop, Pin Worthy Wednesday, Wake Up Wednesday, Hump Day Happenings, Wednesday Roundup, My Stay At Home Adventures, Wonderful Wednesday, Hearth & Soul, Fluster Buster Creative Muster,  Show Me What Ya Got, What's Cooking Wednesday, Its a Party!, Works For Me Wednesday, Sugar and Spice, Hump Day Happenings, Waste Not Want Not,  Wake Up Wednesday, Whatever Goes Wednesday, Wednesday Whatsits, Real Fun, Work It Wednesday, Lovely Ladies, Weekly Creative, Domestic Superhero, All Things Thursday, The Weekly Creative, Together on Tuesday, Tasty Thursday, Full Plate Thursday, Create It Thursday, Fabulously Frugal Thursday, Crafty Thursday Obsessions, Thrifty Thursday,  Showcase Your Talent, Think Tank Thursday, Simple Lives Thursday, What To Do Thursday, No Rules Weekend Bloghop, Foodie Friday, Fabulous Friday, Get Real Frugal Friday, Frugal Fridays, Freakin Did It Friday, Pure Blog Love, Feature Friday, The Pin Junkie, Freedom Friday, Friday Favorite, Foodie Friday, A peek into my paradise, Weekend Social, Foodie Friends Friday, Celebrate It!,  Weekend Retreat, What’s Shakin,  Weekend Potluck, Get Him Feed Anything Goes,  Lil Luna Link Party, Foodie Friday, Foodie Friends Friday, Weekend Potluck, TGI Friday Friday with Friends, Simple Living Foodie Friday, Inspirations, Weekend Wander,  Saturday Night Fever, A Bouquet of Talent, The Party Bunch, Show Off Saturday, I Gotta Create, Show Off Weekend, Show Stopper Saturday, Sweet and Savory, The Weekend Creative, Weekend Potluck, Will Cook For Smiles, Strut Your Stuff Saturday,  Super Saturday Show & Tell, Say G'day Saturday, Sunday Features,  Potluck Party, Sunday Showcase, Snickerdoodle Sunday, Sundae Scoop, Super Sunday, Mop It Up Monday, Merry Monday, Creative Monday, The Scoop, Melt In Your Mouth Monday, Pinch of Joy, Pin It Party,  Made By You Monday, Hunk of Meat Monday,  What’d You Do This Weekend,  Making It Cuter, Time To Sparkle, Inspire Me Monday, Mealtime Monday, Time To Sparkle, Makin You Crave Monday, Clever Chick, Motivational Monday,  Mix it Up Monday,  Save Money Monday, Monday Funday, Anything Goes Monday, Making Monday, Lou Lou Girls, Inspire Me Monday, Marvelous Monday, In and Out of the Kitchen, Memories, Tasty Tuesdays, Tuesdays At Our Home, How To Tuesday, Handmade Tuesday, Making a Home, Show Me The Goods, Totally Tasty Tuesday, All My Bloggie Friends, Retro Repin (Pinterest linkup) Share Your Stuff Tuesday, Tuesday Talent Show, Fat Tuesday, Penny Pinching Party, The Gathering Spot, Anti-Procrastination Tuesdays, Tasty Tuesdays, Two Cup Tuesday, Create, Link, Inspire, The Makers, Wow Me Wednesday, Create and Share