Haystacks Recipe
Really, a gift from the hands is a gift from the heart, especially on Valentine’s Day. Even if you’re “recipe/kitchen challenged” I promise you can make these delicious gourmet chocolate treats yourself without having to sacrifice the budget or your sanity.
So there’s no excuse for you not to create a signature plate of candy for your Valentine. Here’s what you’ll need:
1 bag, 12 oz, good quality chocolate but you can use milk chocolate, semi-sweet, bittersweet, white chocolate or even chocolate bars that you break up. Just make sure they are real chocolate, not just chocolate flavored. And those bark chocolates won’t do for this, unless you’re making these with little kids. They have a lot of paraffin and palm/coconut oil and are not true chocolates at all.
Melt chocolate in double boiler (if you don’t have one, simply put a bowl over a small amount of water in a saucepan. The water should just simmer, not boil, and the bowl should not touch the water.). Or in microwave on medium. Be sure and leave a few lumps – take from heat and stir chocolate until smooth. That way you know you won’t burn the chocolate. Now I will say if you have a really good nonstick or regular saucepan, you can put that on low heat and melt the chocolate, too.
To the melted chocolate, stir in any of these:
1/2 cup (or more depending upon your taste):
Salted mixed nuts
Cashews
Macadamia Nuts
Peanuts
Dried Cherries, cranberries, chopped apricots, or your choice
Miniature marshmallows
Peanut butter morsels
White chocolate morsels
Butterscotch morsels
Coconut
Any fun candy pieces or other sweets your sweetheart likes
You’ll know when you’ve put enough in – actually you can hardly put too much in. As long as the ingredients are coated with chocolate, you’re A-OK. Spray two teaspoons and use them to portion out “haystacks” onto a cookie sheet which has been lined with foil, wax paper, parchment paper, etc. and sprayed. Place in refrigerator to harden. Put into fancy paper cups and voila! You’ve won your sweetheart’s heart!
