Author: Chocolate made with honey is not only possible, it’s downright easy! Honey sweetened chocolate still has the same sheen and snap of chocolate made with sugar, but you get the benefits of honey instead!
With just 4 simple ingredients you will be making your own chocolate at home in just a few minutes!
Making your own dark chocolate at home is actually very fast once you know what you’re doing! With this recipe creating chocolate without sugar (using only natural sweeteners like honey, maple syrup, maple sugar, coconut sugar, or stevia) is simple!
And like all well tempered chocolates, this homemade chocolate will harden in less than 3 minutes (thin layer), has a sharp snap and beautiful sheen, and is solid at room temperature!
No need to store this chocolate in the fridge or freezer, keep it in the pantry for up to 3 years without any issues!
Whether it’s a few chocolate chips in pancakes, chocolate chip cookies, or even just a nice piece of homemade peppermint bark… we enjoy chocolate around here!
But when we started doing the GAPS diet for healing, I knew we needed to eliminate sugar.
And while the amount of sugar carbs in a tablespoon of organic chocolate chips is pretty low, it’s not just about carbs when you’re doing a gut healing diet.
So I started looking into honey sweetened chocolate options and found that there was only one organic honey chocolate option out there, and it was pretty expensive for me to want to buy on a regular basis!
I decided it would be better to attempt to make my own, and thankfully, making your own chocolate with honey is really easy!!
Here are a few ways we love to use this honey chocolate!
Honey Sweetened Chocolate Chips
Honey Sweetened Chocolate Coins
How to Make Honey Sweetened Chocolate
This super simple recipe calls for just 4 ingredients and produces and chocolate that is just as hard, shiny, and versatile and sugar sweetened chocolate.
It’s tempered so it’s shelf-stable and can be used in homemade candies without needing to be refrigerated like most homemade chocolates that use coconut oil!
We’ve used this in our homemade chocolate bars with all sorts of fillings, in these adorable Harry Potter Chocolate Frogs, and more!
Whatever you would normally use “regular” chocolate for, you can use this chocolate for instead!
It’s also a great option for Paleo Honey Chocolate and Primal Honey Chocolate!
Step One:
Gather your ingredients: Cocoa Butter, Cacao (cocoa works too), Honey, and Vanilla Extract.
In a double boiler, melt cocoa butter. A glass bowl works best!
Step Two:
Remove glass bowl from heat and stir melted cocoa butter with a spoon or spatula for 2 minutes. You want to stir quickly enough to emulsify the cocoa fats, but not fast enough to introduce a ton of air into the mixture.
Step Three:
Transfer melted cocoa butter into a room temperature glass bowl. That part is optional, but it does cut WAY down on your stirring time!
Either way, continue stirring until cocoa butter is 90°. At this stage the temperature is low enough you still have the benefits of using honey! We use raw honey in our honey chocolate and since there is no high heat at this stage, none of the beneficial aspects are destroyed!
Reaching 90° while stirring constantly also serves to temper the chocolate, which is what allows it to remain solid and crisp at room temperature.
Otherwise it would be chalky in texture and would develop a white “bloom” after a few hours. This happens with all poorly tempered chocolates, not just honey chocolate.
Step Four:
Add cacao and honey, stir until well combined. Again, be careful not to add a lot of air to the mix. Add vanilla extract and switch to a whisk to get the mixture smooth.
Step Five:
Once mixture is nice and smooth, transfer your completely honey chocolate into whatever chocolate mold you want to use!
Here are a few we like:
Break Apart Chocolate Bar Mold
Mini Candy Bar Mold (perfect for homemade chocolate bars with filling)
Chocolate Frogs (super fun for this Harry Potter recipe!)
and many more!
And of course, these beautiful homemade kisses!
Step Six:
Wait until chocolate is completely solid before removing from molds. This wait time will vary based on how thick the chocolate is.
DO NOT place it in the fridge, or the chocolate will “bloom” and get white scale on it (still edible, but not as pretty).
Once chocolate has been removed from the mold, store at room temperature indefinitely. We have stored them for up to 3 years without issues and without any change in taste or texture!
See the entire process in this video, and get the full recipe below that! Enjoy!
UPDATE: This recipe has been updated to include weight measurements and nutritional information.
Honey Sweetened Chocolate
Ingredients
- 1/2 Cup Cocoa Butter (113g) this is the organic brand we use
- 1/3 Cup Cacao Powder (58g) we use this raw, organic brand - cocoa works too
- 2 Tbs Honey*
- 1 Tsp Vanilla Extract
Instructions
- In glass bowl, melt cocoa butter (double boiler works best). Remove from heat and stir with a spoon or spatula for 2 minutes.
- Transfer to a room temperature glass bowl. Stir for 2 minutes or until mixture is 90°.
- Add cacao and honey. Stir well.
- Add vanilla extract and stir with a whisk until smooth.
- Pour into chocolate mold and allow to sit at room temperature until hardened.
- Remove chocolate from mold and store at room temperature for up to 6 months!
Notes
Homemade Honey Chocolate Nutritional Facts
This label assumes you used honey as the sweetener (2 tbsp)
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This was amazing I wanted to make it again, but use peppermint extract instead of vanilla. Have you ever tried that?
Yay!! I’m actually making peppermint chocolate today! So delicious! I usually do 8-13 drops of food grade peppermint essential oil, but you can use extract as well. So delicious, you’ll love it!
When I added the liquid the mixture sejzed up. How can I prevent this?
While I have had that happen when making sugar sweetened chocolate, it’s never happened to me with the honey chocolate! I’m sorry that happened to you! Can you tell me, did you check the temperature of the cacao butter before adding the cacao? If so, what was it? Next, did you add the liquids before or after the honey?
Let me know those things and I will try to help troubleshoot for you so it doesn’t happen again! :-)
I follow the Specific Carb Diet (SCD) and made these today, skipping the cocoa powder (just using the cocoa butter). I followed your directions exactly, then added 1/4c warmed almond butter after whisking in the vanilla. I filled little “reeses” cup molds and they turned out PERFECT! No refrigeration and still nice and crisp. (I also added a little salt with the vanilla and was amazed at how much sweeter they were!). Thanks for bringing real chocolate back into my life! This is a wonderful recipe–very easy to follow and perfect results!
Yay Carol!! That makes me so happy to hear! Yes, we were missing chocolate on GAPS so I know just how you feel! Thrilled to hear it worked out so well!
Do you think I could substitute butter? I have a milk cow and using butter would be way cheaper for me.
Hi Amy, you’re so blessed to have a milk cow! With we did! As to your question, butter does not solidify in the same way as cocoa butter, so it would not create the same finished product. You can use it to create a delicious chocolate that would keep in the fridge or freezer, but it would not be the crisp, shelf stable product that cocoa butter would. :-)
This chocolate was AWESOME! I usually try to make stevia or monk fruit sweetened chocolates but have always found that even using powdered forms that it always came out grainy. I am type In diabetic but since this is raw honey, the glycemic index is lower. So I can justify this real food rather than OTC dark chocolate bars. I found this not sweet at all – in a good way – or the equivalent of 63% dark chocolate. I like mine a bit darker, like 78%; so I think I would increase the cocoa to 1/2 cup. I used Extra Brut cocoa I bought on Amazon and it is the best tasting, smoothest cocoa I have ever used. I am no cocoa snob, but I have tried raw cacao and even if it has health benefits over cocoa, I like my Extra Brut much better.
I have to admit, I was really irritated with all the stirring of the cocoa butter to get it down to 90 degrees, but oh what a difference tempering the chocolate made! I think that was the problem with the stevia and monk fruit versions. Every recipe just had you melt the coconut oil or cocoa butter then stir in the sweetener right away. I will follow your recipe and method from now on, you betcha! (As we never say in Minnesota, yah sure!)
Thanks a million chocolate times!
Gina
Yay, Gina!! I’m so glad!! This is definitely a favorite recipe around here too!
And you’re right, not all cacao is created equal. We tried about 5 brands before setting on this one (rich dark chocolate taste). I’m glad you have a cocoa you love, and yay for real chocolate back in your life!
Enjoy!