Chocolate covered almonds or nuts are delicious treats which are quite common around the Christmas time and holiday seasons. The almonds are roasted or left raw, then coated with some salt and spices and baked in the microwave. Finally, served after dipping in rich chocolate you just cannot go wrong with these incredibly yummy treats.
However, sweet treats can be unsuitable for people with diabetes or health conscious people. So you need to learn how to make them sugar free as well. Unsweetened baking chocolate, and stevia is used in making sugar-free chocolate nuts.
Complexity level: Moderate
Time taken: About 45 – 50 minutes. Takes about 25-30 minutes to prepare the ingredients and 15-20 minutes for cooking. Makes 1 to 1 1/2 cups.
Ingredients
1. Butter – unsalted, about 4 teaspoon
2. 6 packets of stevia or liquid stevia
3. Lebkuchengewürz or apple pie/pumpkin pie spice – 1 tsp.
4. Raw almonds – unpeeled, about 1 to 1 1/2 cup
5. 2 oz. of baking chocolate unsweetened
6. Artificial sweetener
Normal chocolate covered nuts are really simple to prepare. You can just buy some chocolate from the market, melt it, mix almonds with them, bake them and refrigerate them – and they’re ready to be eaten. Making them sugar-free is a bit tricky.
Process
1. Take a microwave safe dish or a pyrex bowl and spread about 2 teaspoons of the unsalted butter around the bowl and then let it melt in the oven.
2. Then mix in 2 packets of the stevia, which is about about 3/4 teaspoon and granular.
3. Mix the prepared Lebkuchengewürz, see instructions in the packet to prepare the spice mix.
4. Add the almonds in to the bowl and stir well to coat it with the butter. The suggested ingredient is unpeeled almonds. You can use other nuts like cashew, pecans and peanuts too if you wish.
5. Take a cookie sheet. Spread the almonds on the sheet, well spaced in a single layer. Preheat oven a bit and then bake at 325°F for about 15 minutes. The idea is to roast the almonds as per your liking. You may also buy already roasted and salted or unsalted almonds from the market. That’ll save you a lot of work. Salted nuts give a crisp taste.
6. Take the roasted almonds out of the oven and let to cool.
7. Now melt the unsweetened chocolate and 2 teaspoons of unsalted butter in a safe dish or pyrex or in a double boiler. Stir often to make it smooth and creamy. Add the artificial sweetener and mix well.
8. Sweeten further with stevia for taste. Liquid stevia is suggested as granular stevia is a bit grainy.
9. Now add the roasted almonds to the lukewarm chocolate mixture and stir well.
10. Spread the chocolate covered almonds back on a baking sheet. Cover the baking sheet with a plastic wrap for easy cleanup and easy removal of the nuts from the tray. Separate the almonds using forks, knives or spoons. Make sure to not break the nuts.
11. Refrigerate for a few hours.
12. Your delicious chocolate covered nuts are ready.
Tips
The simplest process is if you use sugar free chocolate barks and nestle’s semi sweet morsels and packed roasted almonds. Then all you’ll have to do is melt the two types of chocolate (add artificial sweetener) and mix the almonds and then refrigerate. Your chocolate covered nuts will be ready in a zippy. You can also use salted red skin spanish peanuts or salted and roasted pecans instead of almonds.
