Chocolate Pots - Naughty But Nice

If you are a big fan of chocolate you will love this recipe. Chocolate pots are very easy to make yet are wonderfully rich and indulgent, making them ever so slightly naughty.

Dip your spoon into the deep dark chocolate then sit back and enjoy an incredibly smooth, creamy texture and a long, rich chocolaty aftertaste. You may think when you first make chocolate pots that a small potful won't be enough to satisfy your chocolate addiction, but you'd be wrong.

Chocolate pots are intensely chocolaty, a few mouthfuls of cool creamy chocolate will have your reaching chocolate nirvana in no time (especially if you use top quality chocolate). Yet they are unbelievably simple to make, you can literally throw them together in a matter of minutes and then all they need is an hour or so in the fridge to set.

Not surprisingly, chocolate pots are a popular and acceptable dessert to serve at a casual supper party, or for for a romantic dinner a deaux. The quantities I have given below are enough for two generous portions but you can easily double or quadruple up if you want to make extra. If you don't have Baileys liquer you can use tia maria, dark rum, or either grand marniere or cointreau.

You can use heavy cream in this recipe as well, but it will be incredibly rich and have a heavier texture.

CHOCOLATE POTS 2

Serving Size:
Preparation Time: 5 minutes. Can be made several days ahead
Effort Level: Dead easy
Shelf Life: 5 days in fridge
Ingredients:100g dark chocolate minimum 80% cocoa
180ml single cream
2 tbsp caster sugar
2 tbsp Baileys

Here's What You Do:

Break the chocolate into tiny pieces (I use a food processor for this job, as it breaks down the chocolate to almost a powder, but you could put it in a bag and bash with a rolling pin). The point is it wants to be small so it melts quickly.

Heat the single cream and sugar in the microwave (or on the stove) just until it reaches boiling.
Tip the chocolate into the hot cream and stir until melted, it will immediately thicken.
Add the Baileys and stir well.

Pour into two ramekins and stick in the fridge to chill for several hours.

There! Told you it was easy!

Uma Wylde is a natural born cook. She specialises in creating stunning tastes. If you're having trouble getting food to taste the way you want it to or are just bored cooking the same old things, try following some of her carefully explained recipes at http://www.umawylde.com. Unlike traditional recipes, which often leave you dangling, hers show you how to bring the whole meal together, so everything turns out perfectly.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Uma_Wylde 

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Best Chocolate Cupcake Recipe

Very little compares to the joy of chocolate cupcakes - both serving and consuming them! You can now stop asking yourself how to make cupcakes, especially of the chocolate variety, and get online to investigate the different recipes.

When it comes to birthdays or on festive occasions, chocolate cupcakes become a natural choice of many. The best of chocolate cupcakes need not necessarily be the most elaborate in the making. They are simple but delicious, non messy but a feast for royalty. With a few tips on how to successfully use cocoa in cakes and the combos you can try with this ingredient you will be ready to try out your own cupcakes.

It is very important to use cocoa or chocolate in any other form to the measure because the cakes could turn out a complete disaster otherwise. Also chocolate does not go well with just about any fruit or nut. You need to experiment with how to make cupcakes of chocolate after checking out ingredient combos that work well, like walnuts, raisins and cashew nuts among dry fruits. Here is one of the best chocolate cupcake recipes.

Chocolate Sins

Your line up of ingredients include 2 cups of self rising flour or all purpose flour, a teaspoon each of baking powder and baking soda, 2 cups sugar, 2 eggs (large), 1/2 cup shortening, 3/4 cup each of milk and water, a teaspoon of vanilla essence, 4 ounces of unsweetened and melted baking chocolate.

Prior to getting into the final preparation of the chocolate sins, preheat the oven to about 350 degrees. On a large tray, line the cup cake pans with paper liners and set aside. Take a large cake mixing bowl or the bowl of your food processor and mix together all the ingredients. Mix well for around 5 minutes, alternating speeds low to high. Carefully fill the cup cake liners about 2/3 full. Bake your chocolate sins for around 20 to 25 minutes and allow them to cool. Frost the 'sins' only when they are cooled completely. Alternately grate fresh chocolate slabs and liberally sprinkle each one of your chocolate cupcake indulgences.

If you still want to know how to make cupcakes, then you should indulge in some quality research. Today there are a number of resources that help you in the endeavor. Making chocolate cupcakes is very easy, and like any other baking indulgence once you learn to measure the basic ingredient, you are sorted. These cakes make grand appearances at kitty parties, birthdays and even on the family night out!

There is no denying that chocolate is by far the most preferred flavor in cupcakes. Though cupcakes like chocolate sins seem elaborate, they are not. Chocolate cupcakes also go well will a filling of your choice. All you need to do is cut the baked cupcakes in half, horizontally and place a filling of any fruit of your choice in the center prior to serving the 'sins'. Also try serving them warm with a dollop of vanilla ice cream!

Patrick Garde is the owner of MakeCupcakes.com where you can learn how to make cupcakes.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Patrick_Garde 

 
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Do You Crave Chocolate?

Did you know that chocolate can be good for you? Craving chocolate can be because your body needs it. However, if the chocolate has been processed improperly, it may taste like you expect it to, but some of the food value may be lost. Then you keep craving more chocolate because you did not get what you needed it for - why you craved it, and then it may to turn into an addiction.

Among other things, dark chocolate has the highest antioxidant I have ever seen charted: rated in the 13 thousand ORAC units per 100 grams compared to 980 for Brussels sprouts, 2400 for blueberries, or 5770 (the highest I have seen besides chocolate) for prunes. However, when chocolate is ruined by refined sugar, wax, lard, alkali, trans fatty acids, hormone treated dairy or other cheap fillers; the antioxidant quality may be lacking or non-existent.

There are actually many healing qualities in healthy chocolate; it helps blood platelets stick together less, therefore causing fewer blood clots, heart attacks, and strokes. Healthy chocolate has been shown to decrease LDL (bad) Cholesterol and Cocoa butter contains oleic acid, which is a mono-unsaturated fat like what is found in olive oil and is considered to raise good cholesterol (HDL). It also promotes healthy blood flow and blood pressure, and has even been considered to improve elasticity in blood vessels, improve circulation, overall heart health, and reduce the risk of death from cardiovascular disease.

Healthy chocolate can also improve insulin resistance and sensitivity, which can protect against the onset of diabetes, and there are also many vitamins and minerals contained in healthy chocolate. Do however be careful, and check the ingredients; it is important to get organic chocolate and a good safe sweetener, such as evaporated cane juice, no alkali, diary, or other fillers. Healthy chocolate does not have a long ingredient list.

Also, did you know that there is actually no caffeine in healthy chocolate? Theobromine is the stimulant in healthy chocolate that closely resembles caffeine, even in its molecular structure, and is often mistaken as caffeine. Fortunately it is much gentler than caffeine, which also increases emotional stress. In addition, theobromine stimulates serotonin levels as well as endorphin production, which fosters positive feelings and feelings of pleasure, making it a mild antidepressant.

And what is the most exciting news is that when you 'satisfy' your craving with a moderate amount of chocolate that is complete and processed cleanly; that moderate amount satisfies that craving! If you have a long standing "addiction", then you may need to work on that part of it, but you won't have the true need type of craving left unsatisfied to complicate the issue and thwart your efforts!

With ForeverGreen's, 100% organic, Good for you, Guilt Free, Dross Free 24 Karat ChocolateTM, WOW, what a clean tasting chocolate! Go to http://www.WholiHealth.com and look for "SmartFood: whole food nutrition products" in the right column a little more than halfway down.

There are several forms to choose from; the "24 Karat Fondue Chocolate (natural)", 2 pounds of wafers is the best value.

Also, check out my full free report "Chocolate Guilt Free? Here's how!" in a link in my blog or website.
For more about Nancy Jean, see http://www.WholiHealth.Blogspot.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Nancy_Jean_Nason 

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The Many Faces of Chocolate

No matter how you fix it, chicken is still chicken, fish is still fish, and broccoli is still broccoli. You cook them using various methods, or eat your vegetables and fruits raw, or cooked, but they are always just part of a meal. Chocolate, on the other had, has a myriad of way to be used, hot or cold, used as a drink or part of your main course, as a dessert, as a snack, or as a special treat when you need a pick-me-up. So let us explore the many faces of chocolate.

Start with the lingo. You all know that there is unsweetened and bittersweet chocolate, which is usually used for cooking, or for hat chocolate if you add milk and sugar. Semisweet is usually found in those chocolate chips we love so dearly, though they also come in both milk chocolate and white chocolate (which technically isn't really chocolate at all, since it has no cocoa solids in it...just cocoa butter).

Cacao and cocoa are both used to mean the same thing, though the plant, and the bean itself (before any processing is called cacao). It refers simply to the either raw or roasted bean, without its shell, and with nothing added. If they are chopped up they are nibs, and when ground up they become powder.

Chocolate liquor is formed when you keep grinding the nibs until they become a paste (caused by releasing the cocoa butter from the powder). There is no alcohol in it. All the other forms of chocolate are made from this form of the cocoa bean.

The stuff you use for cooking or baking goes by several different names: unsweetened, pure, bitter, or baking chocolate. It is usually purchased in hard blocks, and is good for when you want to use artificial sugar or make things less sweet. You can, however, purchase a semisweet baking chocolate, which adds the sugar but still does not contain the cocoa butter.

Semisweet (also called dark or bittersweet chocolate) adds sugar and cocoa butter to it to and becomes a less sweet chocolate found in candy bars, chocolate chips, in fondues, and as the chocolate coating on ice cream bars and frozen bananas.

Milk chocolate and sweet chocolate are similar. Sweeter than semisweet, but with no milk solids added, sweet chocolate is not as rich and creamy as milk chocolate, but has a stronger cocoa flavor. And white chocolate has more cocoa butter, milk and sugar, and none of the chocolate liquor, so it really isn't chocolate at all!

The many faces of chocolate are amazing to explore. The beverage you drink is often made from cocoa powder, either sweetened or unsweetened, made with milk or without. It contains very little cocoa butter. Dutch chocolate is cocoa that was washed with potassium carbonate, giving it a darker color and a richer chocolate flavor.

To see our excellent selection of chocolates, visit our website: http://www.indulgeinchocolate.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ryan_C_Wilson 

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The Truth About the Xocai Chocolate

If something sounds too good to be true it generally is. Yes, we would all love chocolate to be as good for us as say, broccoli, and the general consensus has always been that it is pretty much impossible. Until the introduction of a dark chocolate that claims to be 'healthy'. Recently, there has been a buzz on the internet from individuals and organisations looking to debunk the distributors of Xocai and what has come to be known as the Xocai chocolate scam have hit the headlines.

There has been a lot of attention surrounding the Xocai chocolate, and it is small wonder. Any chocolate that makes the bold claim of being actively good for people is bound to make people sit up and take notice. But what is it that makes this particular sweet treat stand out from the crowd?

Well, there appears to be a whole host of factors. It is suitable for vegans and vegetarians, contains fructose as opposed to sucrose, and does not use any of the additives, fillers, flavourings and all those other 'nasties' that makes mothers of small children recoil in horror. Not only that, it contains antioxidants that are widely believed to be beneficial, like acai and blueberry. It is not organic, but MXI claim that does not really matter.

Which it may not to some, but there are of course arguments to the contrary when you're promoting a foodstuff that claims to be actively beneficial. It is Fair-trade recognised, low-GI, and quite importantly - the MXI website claims that it is sugar-free on the homepage of their website, only to contradict that statement further down the page by saying it is low in sugar. Hmm.

Well, it obviously sounded a bit too good and people started doing a bit of digging and hey presto, we have the very newsworthy Xocai chocolate story. It is not just about the ingredients though, far from it. There appears to be a sneaking suspicion doing the rounds that it is some sort of sales swindle; reminiscent of such things as pyramid selling and bogus marketing tricks that draw potential reps in with tales of huge profits but ultimately lose them lots of money.

The Xocai chocolate scam gains momentum when you do a bit of research. The Xocai range is obtainable from a US-based multi level marketing outfit called MXI Corp, a distributor offering a home business opportunity based on a binary sales system. Which basically means that in order to earn a commission from sales, the salesperson must maintain two arms of sales which have to balance. If both sides do not balance, one must make up the shortfall, so reducing the overall value.

The truth about the Xocai chocolate is really quite simple. There are tons of marketing companies and opportunities out there, and at the end of the day, something is only worth as much money as the public is willing to pay for it. And that is true of everything, from high-end face creams to hampers from Harrods. But the Xocai chocolate is not really about what is actually in the product itself, but more about pure marketing and hype. It all boils down to this; the Xocai chocolate scam will fade away if enough chocoholics want to believe in the benefits and such selling schemes remain legal.

No matter what company you are promoting you must first have your own personally branded website to promote yourself first then the company. To learn more about setting up your own Xocai Chocolate Business website go to http://www.irishrenegade.com.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Tom_O'Riordan 

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