Coconut Cacao Bars

Who didn’t love Bounty Bars as a kid? I mean seriously – talk about summer in a chocolate bar!

I realise that this will be my second coconut recipe in the past month, but when a girl has a huge bag of shredded coconut, she’s gotta get resourceful about finding things to do with it. And having spent a fair bit of this winter in chilly Tasmania, I need no excuse to channel warmer climes. This recipe is an adapted version of the childhood classic, sans actual chocolate and refined sugar. It uses the magical properties of coconut’s low solidifying point to turn childhood nostalgia into a slightly more virtuous adult treat.

Ingredients:

2 cups shredded coconut

2/3 cup coconut cream

6 tsp coconut sugar

2 tsp vanilla paste

4 tbsp raw cacao powder

5 tbsp virgin coconut oil

A good pinch of sea salt flakes

Method:

1. Preheat an oven to 180C and line a baking tray with greaseproof paper. Spread out the shredded coconut and toast it in the oven for 10-15 minutes until it just starts to turn golden.

2. Place the toasted coconut shreds in a mixing bowl and add the coconut cream, half of the coconut sugar, the vanilla paste and mix thoroughly.

3. Press in a lined brownie tin so that the mixture is about 2.5cm thick. Place in the freezer for 1 hour until solid. Remove and cut the coconut into bars, about 2.5cm wide. Place the bars back in the freezer.

4. In a small pan, heat the coconut oil on a low heat until melted. Add the cacao and the remaining coconut sugar. Stir to combine and set aside to cool.

5. Once cool (but still in liquid form) remove the bars from the freezer and dip/bath the cacao mixture to coat the bars. The coconut oil in the cacao mixture will almost immediately harden, like Ice Magic. Wait until this happens and then dip the cacao bars again to give them a double thick coating.

6. Sprinkle the bars with a few flakes of sea salt and store the bars in the fridge until you wish to eat them (otherwise they will melt and fall apart).