We don't have total control over what we test and write about for you here on The Chocolate Cult. Companies send us their products and if they are made with something from the cocoa tree, we test them and then reveal them to our worldwide readership. This year is our 6th Annual Halloween Treat Challenge and oddly we primarily received products you have to use in baking, candy making, or as drinks and not treats you could easily hand out to kids dressed up and trolling your neighborhood for candy. While we can't hand out homemade treats for Halloween in most areas of the USA any more, you can make them for our friends and family, you could make them for a spooky party. Your Chocolate Priestess decided to test the
spicy cocoa mix from
Equal Exchange by making one of many recipes I found for cocoa cookies. In this case I'm using one from
bakedbree as my starting point with a few changes for the Halloween season and for my own dietary reasons.
Let's see how the Equal Exchange Spicy Organic Cocoa worked for these cookies.
Here is my recipe for Spicy Hot Cocoa Cookies for Halloween
Ingredients
2 sticks room temperature margarine
1 cup Splenda
5T + 1tsp Splenda Brown Sugar
3/4 C egg substitute
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 1/4 cups whole wheat flour
4 T
Equal Exchange Spicy Hot Cocoa Mix
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 bag Nestle Halloween Morsels
Instructions
1) Cream together both sugar substitutes and the margarine very well, scraping the sides of your bowl as you go.
2) Mix in the egg substitute and vanilla. until well blended.
3) Slowly add in the rest of the dry ingredients. You can either mix the dry ingredients separately or add them alternating between them.
4) Add the baking morsels to the cookie dough and mix in well.
5) Drop onto a cookie sheet using a small ice cream scoop. Do NOT use parchment paper or these will not spread at all. You may need to press down on the cookies a bit even.
6) Bake them in a preheated 375 degree oven for 9 to 11 minutes.
7) Remove cookies from sheet and lay on parchment paper to cool before eating.
I made 46 cookies this way. What do you think of their looks? Each cookie has 98 calories if you make them like I did. If you use regular brown and white sugars, whole eggs, and butter, you'll have a lot more calories per cookie so the choice is yours.
How do the cookies taste and feel? They have a crispy outside but a soft, not underdone inside. The immediate flavor is sweet flour and the morsels then cocoa and finally a little spice kick but over all there is a sweetness to these that I wasn't expecting but which I found pleasant. What did my testers think?
The
Equal Exchange Spicy Hot Cocoa Mix also can be used in drinks if you add it to milk. The results are good if you like spicy chocolate, if you don't this isn't for you. You can tone down the spiciness by using higher fat milk as well. Ultimately though I'd probably use this in cooking and baking more than as a hot cocoa drink. In terms of Halloween treats, good for a party for adults or kids because it isn't too dark tasty or too spicy. However the recipe really could use any baking chips and the cookies aren't particularly spooky. The Spicy Cocoa is Sacrament worthy but not really ideal for or specific to Halloween. I think this is going to be the case all of these season making our 6th Annual Halloween Treat Challenge disappointing for your Chocolate Priestess after five great years of bringing you cool spooky treats.
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