The gourmet version of Raisinets, from Lake
Champlain Chocolates (certified kosher).

Today is National Chocolate Covered Raisins Day. In the form of Raisinets, the dried-fruit-in-a-candy-shell is a movie theater staple and the third-largest selling candy in U.S. history.

To make the candy, raisins are coated with oil and spun in a hot drum with milk or dark chocolate. They’re then polished to a shine.

Raisinets are the earliest brand on record, introduced by the Blumenthal Brothers Chocolate Company of Philadelphia in 1927 (the brand was acquired by Nestlé in 1984).

We don’t know that the Blumenthals originated the concept. Hard chocolate was invented in 1847, enabling confectioners to develop all types of chocolate candies (the history of chocolate). No doubt, chocolate-dipped fruit was in the repertoire.

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Peanut butter cups: We love them!

How can you make the everyday peanut butter cup even better? Create them yourself, using better ingredients than are used in mass-marketed PB cups.

The trick is to buy the most delicious chocolate morsels (or gourmet chocolate) and the tastiest peanut butter. You can use your favorite “shade” of chocolate—dark, milk or white—as long as it’s great stuff.

The good news: The “recipe” is easy.

And it’s timely: You can make peanut butter cups for Easter, topped with jelly beans or other candy Easter ornaments.

Have fun with this one!

We love getting gifts from Chocolat Céleste (it means “heavenly chocolate” in French), a Minneapolis-based artisan chocolatier. The ganache fillings are delicious and the cocoa-butter transfers that decorate the tops are lovely.

If you’re looking for a special box of chocolates for Valentine’s Day, head over to the website and take your pick.

Gift boxes filled with heavenly chocolates are available from 2 pieces to 24 pieces, $7.00 to $64.00.

Read our review of Chocolat Céleste.

Pretty in pink: Valentine chocolates from
Chocolat Céleste.

A French spin on Valentine chocolate. Photo
courtesy Valrhona.

Speak to French chocolatiers and pastry chefs—or anyone trained in the world’s leading culinary schools—and odds are that their chocolate of choice is Valrhona.

It’s one of our favorites, whether for baking or for snacking.

Nestled in the middle of the vineyards of Tain l’Hermitage in the Rhone Valley, France, since 1922 Valrhona has produced the finest chocolate couverture.

A highly regarded pioneer in the prestige chocolate world, Valrhona did not sell its chocolate direct to the consumer until 1986. Prior to then it sold couverture only to chocolate manufacturers.

More recently, the company has created bonbons and other chocolate confections. For Valentine’s Day there’s a gold-speckled, heart-shaped red box holding 15 heart-shaped bonbons:

 
Available exclusively through the Valrhona online boutique for $29.99, it’s waiting to be sent with your personal message, to someone who’d adore a box of fine French chocolate.

More about Valrhona chocolate.

Banana, chile and 77% cacao bar. Photo
courtesy Antidote Chocolate.

People who like very dark chocolate and cacao nibs may find a surprising delight in Antidote Chocolate Bars.

These innovative bars, made in Ecuador with Arriba Nacional cacao beans, are 50% conventionally roasted chocolate and 50% raw cacao nibs.

The result is profound, earthy and higher in antioxidants than just about any other bar.

In addition to basic bars, there are innovative flavor combinations, too:

 
The higher the percentage of cacao, the lower the amount of sugar. The 100% cacao bars have no added sugar (although the dates supply natural sugar).

If your Valentine wants an intense chocolate experience, pick up a few bars or a gift set at AntidoteChoco.com.

Read the full review.

Talk the talk of a chocolate expert. Pick up terms in our Chocolate Glossary.

If your Valentine loves chocolate but is on a sugar-restricted diet, the Choclatique artisans have the solution: Their Sweet Deceit 100% Sugar-Free Chocolate in heart shapes are certain to make someone happy.

The assortment includes solids and truffles (chocolate ganache centers). The chocolates are also gluten- and nut-free and al-natural (no preservatives or artificial flavors).

The chocolate and fillings, which are made with maltitol, taste as close as can be to the “real thing.”

Eight pieces are $20.00, 15 pieces are $35.00 and 30 pieces are $65.00

Buy them at Choclatique.com.

Find more of our favorite sugar-free candy.

You won’t find better sugar-free chocolate than this. Photo courtesy Choclatique.

January 9th is National Apricot Day. We’re not sure why, since apricot season in the U.S. is from May through August (any fresh apricots found in the winter months have made a long trip from the southern hemisphere).

Yet, you can toast the day with an apricot brandy sour, have apricot jam on your toast or sandwich (cream cheese, goat cheese, ham, turkey), make a pork roast with dried apricots, or use the jam as filling in a Sacher Torte.

Here’s a quick and easy way to turn dried apricots into something festive. If you don’t want to make your own, you can order chocolate-dipped apricots from Bissinger’s or Lake Champlain Chocolates (the latter are kosher-certified).

CHOCOLATE-DIPPED APRICOTS RECIPE

Makes 2 dozen pieces.

Ingredients

Make your own or buy them. Photo courtesy Bissinger’s.

*Dark chocolate compliments the apricots best, but you can substitute milk chocolate or white chocolate. The finer quality the chocolate, the better the confection.
 
Preparation
1. For best results, temper chocolate in a chocolate tempering machine. If you don’t own one, melt the chocolate in a chocolate melting pot, microwave oven or double boiler.
2. Place the chopped nuts on a plate or in a shallow bowl, for dipping.
3. Holding an apricot by the rim, dip about half of it in the chocolate. Give it a quick twist, shake off excess chocolate and tap the apricot against the rim of the bowl if excess chocolate remains.
4. Before chocolate dries, dip the top of the apricot into the chopped nuts. Place on parchment paper to set up and cool. If the set up seems slow, place in refrigerator for 3 to 5 minutes.

If you want to sweeten the apricots, glaze them first. Glazed apricots can also be enjoyed without the chocolate dip.

GLAZED APRICOTS RECIPE

Makes 2 dozen pieces.

Ingredients

 
Preparation

1. Boil water in a medium saucepan. Add sugar and stir until it dissolves and a syrup is created.
2. Boil until the syrup reaches 310°F on a candy thermometer (do not stir).
3. Place the pot in a pan of cold water to instantly stop the boiling; then immediately remove the pot and set in a pan of hot water. (This keeps the syrup at the right temperature.)
4. Using a skewer, dip each apricot in the syrup. Shake off the excess syrup and and place the apricot on wax paper to dry.

Recchiuti Confections, one of America’s finest chocolatiers, has expanded and redesigned its line of artisan chocolate bars so handsomely that just one bar makes a nice holiday gift for lovers of fine chocolate.

The eight-bar line includes:

 
Under the wrapper, the bars are equally handsome, scored into rectangles of various shapes like an edible work of art.

The three-ounce bars, in ready-to-hand-out gift envelopes, are $6.00 each. Four-bar sets are $22.00. The flavors are deep and vivid: a wonderful chocolate experience.

The chocolate bars are available online at Recchiuti.com, at the Recchiuti shop in San Francisco’s Ferry Building and at specialty grocers and retailers nationwide.

Great stocking stuffers or small gifts. The
photo shows the chocolate bar broken along
the score lines. Photo courtesy Recchiuti.

Read our full review of Recchiuti Confections.

Find all of our favorite chocolate in our Gourmet Chocolate Section.

We love to bake with white chocolate chips—real white chocolate chips, that is.

Much of the “white chocolate” out there isn’t real chocolate. Check the label: If you see “vegetable oil” instead of “cocoa butter,” it’s an inferior product without delicious chocolate flavor.

White chocolate is made from sugar, milk, cocoa butter, vanilla and lecithin (a natural emulsifier to smooth the chocolate, also listed as soy lecithin). That’s it.

If you care about the best ingredients, buy real white chocolate. We use the real deal from Guittard of San Francisco and Callebaut of Belgium. Otherwise, it’s analogous to using margarine instead of butter. You’ll really notice the difference in flavor.

Both of these white chocolate chip brands have a sweet, fresh cream flavor. The Guittard chips we’re currently using have nutty undertones and hints of citrus and vanilla. (Vanilla is an ingredient in white chocolate, while citrus notes come from the type of cacao beans used to make the cocoa butter.)

Buy the real deal, made with cocoa butter,
not vegetable oil. Photo courtesy Lake
Champlain Chocolate.

If there’s no cocoa butter, a product can’t be called chocolate. It can be called “imitation chocolate,” but no major brand wants that on its label! Thus:

Where To Find White Chocolate Chips

 
If you can’t find white chocolate chips, chop up a white chocolate bar. Our favorite—for eating as well—is from Green & Black’s, available at Whole Foods Markets, many other retailers and online.

FOOD TRIVIA: A bonus for the caffeine-conscious, there’s no caffeine in white chocolate.

Chocolate Lover? Find our favorite chocolate in our Gourmet Chocolate Section.

Chocolate with bacon and pistachios, chocolate bacon peanut butter cups and spicy bacon toffee. Photo by Elvira Kalviste | THE NIBBLE.

From coast to coast, from farmers’ markets to fine restaurants, the pairing of chocolate and bacon is the hottest combination to come along since salted caramels. Artisan confectioners have hopped onto the chocolate-and-bacon bandwagon.

For this week’s Top Pick, we sampled 37 products from 27 confectioners who make chocolate and bacon confections.

We tasted bacon chocolates, bacon-chocolate cupcakes, chocolate bacon caramels, chocolate bacon marshmallows, chocolate bacon marshmallows, chocolate-covered bacon strips and other chocolaty, bacony confections.

What did we discover?

Six winners and five runners up that make for delicious eating and gifting.

Just about everything we tasted was good; but we sought a balance of chocolate and bacon. In more than a few examples, you couldn’t taste the bacon. In others, the bacon element was too salty (and we love salted chocolate and caramels).

So take a look and discover a new way to enjoy chocolate…and bacon:

 
Find more of our favorite chocolates in our Gourmet Chocolate Section.

Find our favorite chocolates in TheNibbleGourmetMarket.com.