Which is exactly why this giveaway from Videri Chocolate Factory of Ralaigh, NC, is perfect!

GIVEAWAY DETAILS:

1. TO ENTER, share a short comment at the bottom of this post or email me at gabrielle {at} honestfare.com (if you want it to be private) telling me how you feel about Valentine’s day this year. Are you into it or are you dreading it? Or do you just not give a shit? Just tell me anything about Valentine’s Day really and I’ll be cool with that. It can be as concise as two words or as long as a paragraph. I’m really excited to see what you all have to say :)

**Okay, for the sake of giving you and example and because it’s only fair that I share my thoughts on Valentine’s Day this year… I’m actually pretty psyched on it! I’ll be spending Valentine’s Day in a “love tent” and camping in the back yard with my sweetheart. We’ll grill some food, look at the stars and, um…

2. YOU MUST ENTER BY FRIDAY, FEB. 8, 2013 by 11:59 pm. And please make sure to key in your correct email when prompted in the comment box (only I will see your email address) so that I can get back in touch with you if you win.

3. THREE WINNERS WILL BE ANNOUNCED ON SATURDAY, FEB. 9 and contacted via email for their mailing addresses. PACKAGES WILL BE SENT OUT MONDAY, FEB. 11 so they can be received on Valentine’s Day!

**UPDATE** And we have some winners!

First place for the grand prize Videri gift basket goes to…
Janet Bliden of Renton, WA
Valentine’s Day has always been a family holiday for us. My 2 daughters always helped prepare a special meal for our #1 love! We all dressed up in our finest party dresses and had a lovely candlelit dinner on the good china. The best part of the evening was watching my daughters stand on Dad’s feet as they slow danced with their Valentine. The girls are all grown up now, but my husband and I will still share that special meal and dancing. I’ll be serving your lovenadas for dessert because every needs a little chocolate for romance.

And our two runners up for the assorted chocolate bars are…
Kelly Edminston of Beaufort, SC
Usually Valentine’s Day is not a big deal. My husband and I got married the week before, so that’s when we usually would celebrate the love we shared. However, this year it looks like I will be meeting with a divorce attorney instead, so the whole month is just a bust! Ha. A little chocolate would go a long way to cheering me up, that’s for sure! Thanks for the chance to win. :)
AND
Karen Collins of Hamburg NY
Married over 30 years now ( didn’t know the ancients read this, did you?), and there is a great difficulty this year, as for the last few, to make valentine’s day really reflect what i feel about my husband. we don’t do cards, flowers, boxes of chocolates, dinners out. I would like to give him a few poems from neruda and others, to let him know I’m seriously into him still. A bottle of wine and a decent dinner at home are the mainstays— and homemade heart cookies.

**NOTE**
I just want to thank everyone who participated by sharing their personal Valentine’s testimonials via comments and emails. I was hooked reading all your touching and hilarious stories! Thank you again for taking the time. xoxo, Gabi.
And, don’t be bummed if you weren’t selected as one of the winners because everyone can actually get something from Videri this Valentine’s Day. Just enter the COUPON CODE: VDAY to get FREE SHIPPING on all purchases made the month of February! Check out the goodies on their online shop.
- end update –

So as a new Partner here on Honest Fare, I want to tell you a little more about Videri Chocolate Factory, the artisan chocolate makers based out of Raleigh, NC committed to making the best tasting, fair trade and organic chocolate in the South! I find it pretty amazing that the entire process of hand sorting and then grinding and tempering cocoa beans all is done within their quaint factory/retail space. Their chocolate bars are even molded and then each and every one is hand foil wrapped by a talented group of friends chocolate lovers! I really respect what they’re doing, and as a lover of Videri chocolate for over a year now, I can honestly say that it’s really great quality stuff. They recently sent me an awesome assortment of chocolate bars – my favorites being the peppermint as well as the peppercorn (which I’ve never had anything like). They also do some really creative chocolate truffles like the Chai Tiger (dark milk chocolate ganache flavored with chai tea); Bee’s Knees (a caramel flavored with cinnamon and vanilla and honey) and my favorite, the Turkish Coffee (blend of dark and milk chocolate flavored with espresso and cardamom). SO good! And they’re even doing a sippable chocolate beverage now too that’s rich and addictive.

Remember to use the COUPON CODE: VDAY when you order online to get the free shipping, and if you’re ever in their area, Videri’s doors are wide-open offering tours and information to anyone curious about the process of handmade chocolate.

Now on to the recipe for these lovely chocolate lovanadas!

Some of you may already know that outside of this blog I co-own La Empanada Food Truck in Winter Park, Florida. We have over 50 kinds of gourmet empanadas in our rotation, so as you can imagine empanadas are always on my mind. I’m especially excited about coming up with this new take on the empanada appropriately dubbed the ‘lovanada’ for Valentine’s Day.

These chocolate cinnamon lovanadas are hot, gooey and rich inside like a lava cake, but I find that the subtle pastry dough creates a perfect balance so they’re not too overwhelming and the perfect individual portion size.

I basically just made a very simple chocolate filling by cooking baker’s chocolate with cinnamon and whipping cream and sugar and then let it cool in the fridge to achieve a nice scoopable ganache-like texture. Of course I used only the finest baker’s chocolate from Videri, but you can use any baker’s chocolate in this recipe.

Try to control yourself when the intoxicating aroma fills your kitchen…it’s intense. I was essentially drinking this stuff at one point.

About the adorable pink dough…
You can use a little red food coloring to tint your dough pink during the mixing process. I actually experimented with a natural method of tinting using beet juice, but it ended up being pretty involved so I’m going to recommend the food coloring or no tinting at all. I’ll tell you about the beet juice way in case you have the time or are just interested though. You can boil a peeled and diced beet in like 1 cup of water and cool it. You end up with a deep red colored juice of which you add a few tablespoons of to your dough mixture to make it pink. However, I found that a lot of the color cooks out during baking so you should actually brush the lovanadas with some additional beet juice along with your egg wash before baking. The beet juice thing is great in theory, but there’s no guarantee on color. Your call.

Either way this dough is absolutely fantastic. I’m really happy with the recipe. It’s not too flaky and not too dense so it’s perfect here to give these good texture. Definitely a keeper if you’re looking for a good dough recipe that’ll work with for sweet of savory.

Use a heart-shaped cookie cutter or make yourself a paper or cardboard stencil to get consistent shapes. You’ll need two hearts per lovanada – one for the top and one for the bottom. Then you’ll scoop the chocolate filling onto one heart and cover with another and press the perimeter firmly with a fork to seal.

You might want to bake off a couple tests just to make sure you’re putting in the desired amount of chocolate filling before you make them all. I topped them with a little powered sugar to set off the dough a little and make them look even more romantic!

And yes, we will be serving these on the truck the week of Valentines day so come by if you live in the area!

*** Don’t forget to leave your comment about Valentine’s Day below by 11:59 pm on Friday, Feb. 8 to be entered in the Videri chocolate giveaway!

I present to you the golden berry.

Also known as Incan berries or golden cherries. Ever heard of them?

Mind blowers. They’re unlike any berry I’ve ever had and everyone I’ve let try agrees. It’s hard to articulate the uniqueness of their flavor, but they’re somewhere between a dried cherry and cranberry.
First six things that come to mind:
Withered yet gummy.
Tart like sour patch kids.
Sweet like jam.
Dried cranberries are dead to me.
A miniature elbow filled with tiny snappy seeds that are fun to pop with your teeth.

Okay so now that you know exactly what these intriguing little fellas taste like you probably want to know where to get them… Rich Nature! This company was one of the very first to import goji berries back in the late 1990s before they were really available in the marketplace, and today they’ve expanded their product line to include all kinds of organic super berries (goji berries, golden berries and muleberries). For me, the quality is much better than anything I’ve purchased elsewhere (the goji berries are especially large, moist and chewy) and the prices are great. Annnnnd, as a new partner here on Honest Fare, they’re offering all of you a generous 18% discount on all your purchases! Hell yeah.
Just use this code at checkout: HONEFARE1212

They also do chocolate covered super berry treats that are incredible. I can’t recommend the chocolate covered goji berries enough though. They’re impossibly good. I just placed an order for the holidays actually.
* Click on their pretty ad to your right in the sidebar and visit their shop to use your coupon code!

Our star ingredient in these “super berry scones” is the golden berry or golden cherry – rich in phosphorous, calcium, and vitamins A, C, B1, B2, B6, B12 and protein. Yes, protein! For a fruit, golden berries are extremely high in protein (16%). The Greek yogurt and nuts add some additional protein here as well. And in an effort to make the healthiest scone on earth, of course I used whole-wheat flour and coconut oil instead of butter… (tried it both ways and had similar results with the butter being slightly fluffier and more…well, buttery tasting).

Prior to these I had never made scones before and kind of figured they’d be a bit of a pain. They’re actually really simple and quick though! After combining all the wet and dry ingredients you just roll the dough into one or two balls depending on how thick and large you want each scone to be (I did two softball-sized balls because I wanted mini scones).

Then flatten each ball out and cut into wedges of your desired size, like a pizza. I dusted the cutting board pretty good with flour to avoid sticking and it also helps significantly if you let the dough chill in the fridge for about 20 minutes before working with it.

I’ve made these a three times and the results have been great. Very nice texture and crumble and not overly dense like some whole wheat baked goods can sometimes turn out.

It’s the perfect scone for dunking!

I used golden berries and currants, pecans and walnuts here, but these will work with any dried fruit/berry or nut. I think goji berries and almonds or even dried cherries and pecans would be awesome!

Instead of sugar I used honey. And rather than butter, I went with coconut oil. Also added some coconut flakes and flax seeds for good measure. And I didn’t have any raisins so I used goji berries.

And there you have them – Coconut Oat Goji Berry Cokkies. Impossibly good. They’re somewhere between an oatmeal raisin cookie and a coconut macaroon. But they taste healthy so they’re perfect for breakfast! I’ve experimented using brown sugar in place of half the amount of honey and it results in a sweeter and richer cookie, so definitely do that if you’re looking for more of a sweet treat.

I happen to love raisins, but I didn’t miss them at all here. In fact, the earthiness of the goji berries is fantastic with the nutty sweetness of the coconut flakes. Not to mention that goji berries are great for you! Super food status, with one of the highest vitamin C ratings and more iron per serving than spinach and amnio acids than bee pollen. They’re also said to increase HGH (Human Growth Hormone) production. Nothing wrong with cookies that keep you young and beautiful! And here’s a great source for organic goji berries online. The dark chocolate covered ones are awesome too….obviously not for cooking with though.

If you haven’t experimented with coconut oil before, this recipe is a great place to start. You’ll be shocked at what a fantastic substitute it is for butter. In this case, the coconut oil results in a much cleaner and less greasy cookie, but you can actually use coconut oil as a substitute for other oils and butter in most your cooking and baking. (Some additional info on the health benefits of coconut oil.)

These things are cookie monster material. Luckily they’re guilt free!

Just look at this thing.

Can it even be called a pie though if it lacks that fundamental flaky element? Semantics. If it looks like a pie and it feels like a pie, it’s a pie! No crust means less fuss and a whole lot healthier pie (in most cases), so lets just go with it.

For me, the only issue going crustless presents is a structural one. How can you get the whole thing to stay together without first laying that crusty foundation? I’ll tell you: It’s all in the fruit you use and how you slice it. Here, we went with apples – the most structurally sound of fruits. First, you’ll want to peel the apples and then use a mandolin or sharp knife to slice the fruit into 1/8-inch rounds. Don’t cut the fruit into wedges before doing this because you want your slices of fruit to be as large as possible. They should be like sheets. So just work away at one side of the apple until almost reaching the core and then flip it over and do the other side. Then you can slice the excess pieces off the core and reserve them for the binding sauce we’re going to make.

Binding sauce? I don’t know, that’s just what I’m calling it. The binding sauce is basically an apple sauce made by cooking down the excess apple pieces with some water, sugar and a thickening agent like cornstarch or arrowroot. Then you blend it up to make the silky sauce that’s brushed between each layer of apples as you build your pie. It holds all the layers together, like cement, so it’s not a step you can skip!

Assemblage of the pie is pretty simple. You start by lightly greasing the bottom of the pie pan, and then sprinkling with some cinnamon and sugar. Then you do a neat installation of apple rounds, followed by the binding sauce. And so on, until you get to the top of your pie dish. Like so…

And stacking it all up this way will ensure that you get a nice and neat cross section. Like so…

The blueberry sauce is cooked in the same exact way. It’s totally optional, but I recommend it for a little extra flair (the color bleeds through and is so pretty). Spread it on top of the pie just before baking.

I didn’t add the walnuts until the end so they wouldn’t burn. Another option is to sprinkle on some granola if you for that crunch you might miss without the crust.

The almonds!

What makes these muffins (or cake/bread if you choose to do that instead) so great for you is the almond factor. Instead of refined flours we use almond meal, which is very easy to make just by pulsing your almonds in the food processor a few times. There are just tons of health benefits linked to eating almonds (like lowering cholesterol), and almonds are loaded with vitamin E, antioxidants and monounsaturated fats (the same fats found in olive oil). By the way, go ahead and use almonds with the skin on because the flavonoids found in almond skins paired with the vitamin E in the their meat have been shown to more than double antioxidant power in the body. More on that here.

The eggs and almonds pack a good amount of protein, and then paired with the sugars in the banana, these muffins give you a nice boost of long lasting energy. Really nice for the morning.

So this recipe is pretty much brilliant, and I can say that because it’s not originally mine. It came from Jules over at the Stone Soup who is committed to cooking using 5 ingredients or less. Love that. (I did add to the recipe a little here and there so it’s not as simple as the original, but whatever.)

It just blows my mind when baking is so simple, successful and so guiltless too! One important thing to watch out for though is that you don’t pulse the almond meal too long in the food processor or you’ll end up with almond butter. Just stop when it gets like couscous. And if you can, also use a food processor to beat the eggs together with the banana so the mixture gets really really fluffy – this will help with the overall texture. If you can handle these two steps, you’ll find this recipe pretty no fail. I’ve made several variations of this same core recipe many times. It works great as bread or muffins, and feel free to add in more cinnamon and even some raisins. For today though, I’ve added cocoa powder to half the batter to give it a chocolaty center!

Everyone loves a little chocolaty surprise. It’s super easy to do this. You just mix some unsweetened cocoa powder into 1/3 of your batter. Then you do a scoop of original batter, followed by a small scoop of the chocolaty batter, followed by another scoop of the original batter. The result is a subtle hit of cocoa goodness at the center of each muffin that nobody will know about until they take a bite! (If you’re doing bread, just follow the same idea using your bread pan.)

Topping it off with some thinly sliced bananas & almonds and a few dots of coarse sea salt is a nice touch too. Oh yes, that salty + sweet.

I’ve been hanging on to an interesting beet cake recipe for a while now. Must be time to give it a try.

Video by Tiger in a Jar

This one is a new creation for me. A few weeks ago I picked up a bottle of rose water from the Middle Eastern market and my intention was to make some kind of rose water infused cookie…maybe with pistachios.

Side note: I recently downloaded a copy of Soup Stone’s 5 ingredient baking cookbook and have been so inspired by it. If you’re not familiar with SoupStone , it’s run by a food scientist committed to only cooking meals and baking treats with 5 ingredients or less. I love the concept and agree with her philosophy of keeping things super simple. You should check out her blog and free online cookbooks.

Anyway, figuring the rose water would go nicely in a macaroon, I started doing some research on different macaroon recipes, which I have very little experience with. I wanted something easy though (5 ingredients or less style) and all of the classic macaroon recipes I found seemed too frilly for my mood. The creams/sweet spreads that usually go sandwiched between French style macaroons were kind of turning me off…the last thing we want for Valentine’s day ;)

So I went out on a limb and did a combination of a few things I’d read – basically Frankensteined a recipe for an almond Passover cookie with Martha Stewart’s French Macaroon recipe – and came up with these!

They are FANTASTIC. Just sweet enough. Fluffy and chewy. Sort of reminiscent of nougat with the perfect hint of rose water at the end. Jason says they are the perfect cookie.

The best part about them is that they’re the kind of cookie you can make in your sleep. Almonds, pistachios, sugar, pinch of salt and cream or tarter (optional) in the food processor until a sandy consistency. Add an egg white, rose water and a couple drops of food coloring (optional) and blend.

The dough is kind of sticky and thick which makes it easy to form into nice little mounds.

They’re quick to bake and oh so lovely. You definitely have time to throw these together, especially if you’re in a Valentine’s Day pinch like me! Plus, there’s nothing more romantic than the sweet scent of roses…

It’s a little place, but I can spend an hour in there walking the aisles and asking questions about every other thing I pick up. The other day I spotted some packages of what looked like the most delicate cashmire yarn sitting among some other candies and dessert items. Beautiful…but edible?

Yes, Turkish cotton candy, or pismantye, is both. Pismantye is combination of flour, butter, sugar and often pistachio or cocoa that’s pulled or spun into threads. It’s light and fluffy with a slightly sweet and nutty flavor, rather than sugary, fruity and artificial one.

I feel like it’s what cotton candy was intended to be before someone decided it should turn your tongue blue. Seriously, heavenly. Like strands of cookie that melt in your mouth.

And by total coincidence, I came across this video on cookingissues.com that shows how the traditional hand-pulled version made. Really cool. You can totally do it at home!