Do you dread the deluge of sugar-filled, dairy-packed chocolate that surrounds you each year at Easter? I sure do.
What if I told you there was a way to bring the joy – and the healthy eating – back into Easter?
All you have to do is make yourself some of these raw vegan chocolate Easter eggs, and you can finally join in the festivities, guilt-free.
These dairy-free, sugar-free versions of Easter eggs use our super-simple homemade raw vegan chocolate in some gorgeous Easter egg moulds to create delicious treats that anyone would envy.
Just whisk up the ingredients in a bowl, wait for it to reach the right temperature, and then pour the mix into your moulds.
If you’re making small, whole Easter eggs, just throw them into the fridge to set, glue them together with some more melted chocolate, and you’re done.
You can even wrap them in some fancy foil paper to make them look even more like “proper” Easter eggs.
They’d make a pretty good gift for someone at that point too.
You can also make hollow raw vegan chocolate Easter eggs with this recipe.
It’s a touch more fiddly, involving filling the moulds, waiting for it to begin setting and then removing the excess chocolate, but they do look freaking awesome when they’re done.
Now all you have to do is decide what surprise you’re going to hide in the middle.
Looks like you might be headed for a much happier Easter this year!
Raw Vegan Chocolate Easter Eggs
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup cacao butter , melted (170g)
- 1/4 cup agave nectar (65g)
- 2/3 cup cacao powder (60g)
- 1/4 tsp vanilla bean powder or 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/64 tsp salt , finely ground *
Method
- Melt cacao butter at around 40-45°C (104-113°F) on a double boiler or in a dehydrator.
- Grind salt to a fine powder (e.g. in a mortar and pestle).
- Add agave nectar to cacao butter.
- Sieve cacao powder, vanilla powder and salt into butter and agave mix.
- Whisk until smooth.
- Keep stirring and whisking until chocolate reaches around 31°C (88°F).
- Pour into moulds.
- If making solid easter eggs, put them into the fridge to set.
- If making hollow easter eggs, leave until chocolate begins to set on the outside of the moulds.
- Spoon out excess chocolate, and use spoon to ensure that inside of mould is thoroughly coated.
- Put into the fridge until completely set.
- Pop chocolate easter eggs out of the mould.
- (Optional) Fill hollow eggs with special treats.
- "Glue" halves together with extra melted chocolate.
- Store in the fridge or at room temp.
Preparation
- Before: 20 mins (to melt cacao butter)
- During: 30 mins
- After: 1 hour (to set chocolate)
- Need: Dehydrator or double boiler, Easter egg moulds
Notes
* Yes, I really do mean 1/64 tsp of salt. See tips below for more details.Nutrition Information
Tips
- I had to guess the volumes for the ingredients in this recipe, because we’ve always made it by weight, so it can be accurate and reproducible. Chocolate is a fussy beast in our experience. If you make it by volume, you may need to fiddle with the amounts until you’re happy with the results, but if you make it by weight, it should turn out well.
- Melting the cacao butter will be much easier and faster if you grate it first. If you can buy it already “kibbled” that can save you even more time and effort.
- A dehydrator is the perfect tool for melting cacao butter because it keeps it at a constant temperature, and no higher, so it’s guaranteed to be raw. It does, however, take longer than a double boiler. As a bonus, using a glass bowl helps to maintain the temperature while you work with it.
- If you use a double boiler, keep a close eye on it to make sure it doesn’t get too hot and overheat your cacao butter. As always, make sure to keep any water out of the butter to avoid seizing your chocolate.
- My preference is to use agave nectar for this chocolate, because the flavour works really well. I have tried coconut nectar, but I found the flavour a bit strong for my taste. You could also try maple syrup as well, but ultimately you’ll need to be guided by your taste buds.
- If you do use a different liquid sweetener in your raw vegan chocolate Easter eggs, you may need to adjust the quantity to ensure that the chocolate sets properly, because each liquid sweetener contains a different amount of water.
- To make your chocolate mix as smooth as possible, I highly recommend sieving your dry ingredients into the mix. This ensures that there are no nasty lumps of undissolved cacao power waiting to spoil your beautiful creations.
- This recipe is about 78% cacao solids, which means that it’s a pretty dark chocolate. If you’re not a fan of dark chocolate, then you’ll probably want to give this recipe a miss.
- Vanilla bean powder is just fresh vanilla beans air-dried and ground into a powder using a spice blender or coffee grinder. You can make your own or you can buy it from your local health food shop. If you can’t get your hands on any of this, you can just scrape out a fresh vanilla bean or two into the mix. Vanilla extract will definitely upset the balance of ingredients, and your chocolate may not set properly, so I wouldn’t recommend it for this recipe. You can always leave it out entirely if you just can’t get your hands on any.
- I always grind the salt in a mortar and pestle to make sure that there are no big lumps, and so it dissolves properly into the chocolate. The last thing you want is to bite into a salty bit of chocolate when you’re not expecting it. If you don’t have a mortar and pestle, just buy the finest salt you can, and make sure to whisk your chocolate very thoroughly so everything has a chance to dissolve completely.
- I always use pink Himalayan crystal salt in my recipes because it contains lots of trace minerals that are good for you, and I like to use the best quality ingredients whenever I can.
- If you start with your cacao butter just over 40°C (104°F) and your agave at room temperature, you’ll find that the mix drops to around 33°C (92°F) when you add the dry ingredients, which is close to temper. Just whisk it heaps straight away, and by the time you’re done it will be very close to being ready.
- Warming chocolate and then cooling it down brings it into “temper”, which ensures you get a nice hard chocolate that has a lovely sheen and makes a loud “snap” when you break it – all good signs of a high-quality chocolate.
- Keep an eye on the temperature of your kitchen when making this chocolate, because if it’s too warm, then the chocolate may never cool down properly. If you need to, you can move it to a cooler spot, or rest the bowl on some ice-packs to help it along. You’ll also need to get the chocolate straight into the fridge after pouring it into the moulds to stop it from separating out.
- If you’re making hollow chocolate Easter eggs, you’ll have to perfect the art of letting the chocolate set a bit, but not too much, and then promptly removing the excess chocolate from the middle. I tried “pouring” mine like all the recipes say, but by the time it was thick enough to start setting on the outside, it was almost too thick to pour out. Besides, what are you supposed to do if you have four moulds on one sheet?! So instead I spooned out the excess and made a right mess of the insides of my eggs, including making them way thicker than they probably should have been. But they looked fabulous on the outside, and I had space in the middle to “hide” stuff, so that was all I needed. Maybe next year I’ll stick with solid eggs ;)
My inspiration
I’ve been wanting to create a raw vegan chocolate Easter egg recipe for a while.
Naturally Easter comes around every year, and every year I’ve had to deal with the sugar-laden treats everyone tries to share with us.
And while I appreciate the thought, I’d really rather eat something healthier if I can. I’d also like my kids to be surrounded by healthier options too.
I played with a few ideas over the years, including an “almond and date crust” squashed into Easter egg moulds, but sadly nothing won over my kids.
It wasn’t until we perfected our homemade raw vegan chocolate recipe that we finally had a viable option.
We eagerly tried our fabulous Easter egg moulds with our fantastic raw chocolate recipe, and it was a success.
Making the hollow Easter eggs was fiddlier than I expected, but we still managed to pull it off, and we could finally give our kids an Easter treat to be proud off.
Here’s hoping that it can do the same for you.
Resources
If you’re looking for fabulous Easter Egg moulds, here’s a few places to start your search:
- Easter Moulds @ Roberts Confectionery (in Australia)
- Easter Egg Moulds @ Amazon.com (in USA)
- Easter Egg Moulds @ Amazon.co.uk (in UK)
And have a fabulous Easter!
