This season it seems everywhere I look, I see chocolate topped with sea salt, caramel made with fleur de sel, or salted candies of some kind. And it tastes so good; that combination of salt, sugar and chocolate! I looked through our holiday recipes, and found a really easy sea salt, chocolate and caramel version. It looked easy enough for a kid.
So I enlisted the help of a very savvy 9 year-old in the kitchen. And I was right. My Little Assistant followed the directions, melted chocolate, dipped caramels and consulted on salt-chocolate flavor combinations. We ended up with 3 kinds: dark & mint chocolate with black lava sea salt, semi-sweet chocolate with Hawaiian clay sea salt and cinnamon, and semi-sweet chocolate with bamboo sea salt and lemon zest.
They were all delicious, but the ones with lemon zest added a lovely citrus twang, and reminded me of summer. So they were my faves (shown above).
Chocolate Dipped Caramels with Sea Salt by Meals.com
Ingredients:
- 1 cup (6 oz.) Semi-Sweet Chocolate Morsels
- 1 teaspoon vegetable shortening
- 1 pkg. (5.5 oz.) about 25 pieces, soft & chewy rectangular caramels, unwrapped*
- 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon coarse sea salt
Directions:
LINE baking sheet with wax paper.
MICROWAVE morsels and vegetable shortening in small, uncovered, microwave-safe bowl on HIGH (100%) power for 1 minute; STIR. The morsels may retain some of their original shape. If necessary, microwave at additional 10- to 15-second intervals, stirring just until morsels are melted; cool slightly.
DIP caramel pieces, using a fork, into melted chocolate. Shake off or scrape excess chocolate against side of bowl. Place on prepared baking sheet. Sprinkle with sea salt. Refrigerate for 15 minutes or until set.
* 25 square caramels can be substituted for the rectangular caramels.