Happy Valentines' Day

In honor of Valentine’s Day I am posting my mostly raw chocolate macaroon recipe. This recipe calls for a dehydrator. It’s a variation of the Macaroon recipe found in Pure Wine and Food's Raw Food Real World. These don’t have to be just chocolate as I like to add cinnamon and nutmeg to mine. Nutmeg always makes food taste like a holiday. Indian spices are wonderful to add as well as chilli powder like the wonderful exotic chocolate from Vosage. Vosage is the brainchild of chocolatier, Katrina Markoff. I had the good luck of hearing her speak at a conference with Jim Lasko of Redmoon Theater. A while back they combined forces to create a musical called The Golden Truffle. I met Katrina that day and she was a total doll. Her store in Lincoln Park is just a piece of zen chocolate heaven. The Vosages stores and packaging are decorated in the most beautiful shade of dark purple and I don’t even like purple but I love that purple!

Chocolate Macaroons

Ingredients:
3 cups of dried unsweetened coconut flakes
1 ½ cups organic cocoa powder (or carob powder if you are cutting back on caffeine, but honnestly not as good)
1 cup of maple syrup or agave (sometimes I do ½ cup of each)
1/3 cup coconut oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp sea salt
½ tsp nutmeg
1 tsp cinnamon

Combine all of the above in a large bowl and stir well.

Use an ice cream scooper or a table spoon to scoop out rounds of the mixture. I prefer to use my hands and make little round balls. If you are using your hands place the mixture in the fridge for a bit too firm it up. Place these evenly on your dehydrator sheets. Dehydrate at 115 degrees, some raw foodists prefer 109 degrees or whatever “live” temperature is in fashion. It should take about 12-24 hours for the macaroons to become crisp on the outside and moist on the inside.

I usually store in cellophane bags or brown bags and they last a 2-4 weeks. If you put them in plastic ziplock bags they get too soft. Of course if you find your macaroons getting too dry then go ahead and store them in some plastic for a while to re-soften.

One note: Once I used supermarket brand Hershey’s unsweetend dark cocoa powder and the macaroons came out an unappetizing black like little pieces of coal. So to fix this I rolled them in a small bowl filled with cinnamon and nutmeg which made them a nicer shade of brown. You can always experiment with rolling the macaroons in various sugar or spices to alter the color or flavour.

And now a feast for the eyes . . . the 12 x 12 show at the Museum of Contemporary Art is featuring “Giotto’s Dream” an exhibition of paintings and drawings by Jeni Spota. Using Pasolini’s interpretation of Boccaccio’s medieval allegory The Decameron, specifically Giotto’s dream sequence. This work mostly features crucifixes not my usual fave them but they are done in the greatest impasto style like cake frosting so of course I love that!