I shouldn’t be allowed to be left at home for a weekend by myself, I end up staying late watching TV Shows on the internet and then make sweet treats during the day!
All in the name of getting content for the blog though right, so it’s okay! And it’s not the only thing I did, I did also do my training and some admin work for Bootcamp including planning for 2017.
Plus making these sweet treats did cross something else off my list – Christmas Presents for some people who have done a lot for me this year! Two birds, one stone and all that.
Kyle was away in Hamilton for the weekend so I didn’t have the car so I came up with things I could make using only the ingredients we had in the house. I usually wouldn’t have glacé cherries or chocolate in the house, but I am planning on making a ‘full fat, full sugar’ Christmas Cake this year so had purchased the cherries to go in that! The chocolate has lasted a couple of weeks as I made a Chocolate Peanut Butter Oat slice the week before.
I based this Chocolate Cherry Christmas Pudding Bliss Ball off my 5 Ingredient Chocolate Mint Bliss Balls and then made some adjustments to make them Christmas themed. Don’t worry if you don’t like Christmas Pudding, these are named Chocolate Cherry Christmas Pudding Bliss Ball because they kind of look like a Christmas Pudding, rather than tasting like one.
If you don’t like glacé Cherries, or don’t want the added sugar you could substitute almost anything in their place and they would still be delicious, I’d recommend trying either fresh Cherries, some dried strawberries or crystallised ginger!
Chocolate Cherry Christmas Pudding Bliss Balls
Ingredients
Makes 24 Balls
2 Cups Dried Dates
2 Cups Mixed Nuts (I used 1.5c Cashews & 1/2 Cup Walnuts)
1 Cup Coconut Chips (Desiccated Coconut would also work)
4 Tablespoons Dark Cocoa Powder
1 Cap Vanilla Essence
28 glacé Cherries (Whole Cherries with the pip removed would also work!)
75 grams Dark Chocolate (I used 72% as that is what we had)
Directions
1. Boil the jug and pour boiling water over the dates in a bowl.
2. Add the mixed nuts, coconut chips, cocoa, vanilla essence to the Food processor.
3. Once the dates have softened, add them to the food processor without the liquid and process all the ingredients.
4. Grab a small ball of mixture from the food processor and flatten in your hand – press a cherry into the middle and wrap the mixture around the cherry, roll into balls.
5. Continue step #4 until all of the mixture is gone, it made 24 balls for me, it may make a different quantity depending on how big you make them.
6. Pop the chocolate into a microwavable safe bowl and melt.
7. Using a fork (or your hands) dip the bliss balls into the chocolate so that half the bliss ball is coated, let the excess chocolate drip back into the bowl.
8. Sit down on baking paper on a baking tray (or other suitable dish that will fit in your fridge or freezer).
9. Once all the balls have been half coated in chocolate, chop the remaining 4 cherries into small pieces and press one onto the top of each of the bliss balls into the side coated in chocolate.
10. Pop in the fridge or freezer until the chocolate has hardened.
These would look pretty cool with white chocolate melted over them instead of dark chocolate as well!
What sweet foods are you making for Christmas this year??
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