Rainbow Chocolate Bark

I’m not into candy.But I was perusing the chocolate section in my local Trader Joe’s and an item caught my eye: rainbow-colored chocolate-covered sunflower seed pieces. First reaction: Wierd! Second reaction: That’s so weird, it’s kinda cool! I reached for them. Perfect for a chocolate bark topping. As a rule, I stay away from anything with artificial colors. Then I looked at the ingredients and saw things like red beet powder, paprika and turmeric! Alright, very acceptable. Once a year, let’s go for it! If this isn’t available to you, and you’re willing to get a tiny bag of plain M&M’s, chop them up and call it a day.

If not, go the natural route and get the color from chopped apricots, pistachios, toasted coconut, slivered almonds. Important thing: have lots of fun with it.

Best way for me to melt chocolate is to roughly chop about half the chocolate.

Melt it for a minute, then another half a minute, and vigorously stir in the rest of the chopped chocolate. The whole batch melts up easily and gently. If not, microwave for another half-minute and stir thoroughly again. For more info on the technique behind melting chocolate and to check out more recipes for chocolate bark (both dark and white), click here.  You’ll find, “Nuts for Bark”, that I posted during bb’s first year.

Did you know chocolate breaks into shard-like pieces? Fascinating stuff, this chocolate.

Ahhh, melted and smooth

We need to move very fast with melted chocolate. Once you spread it in the pan, it starts to re-set almost immediately.

Best defense: Have all your ingredients out and ready to sprinkle on once you spread the chocolate in the pan.

This will be a perfect addition to what I’m bringing to my Annual Food Bloggers LA Cookie Swap.

I’ll also be bringing  my Blueberry Coconut Mini Cupcakes (click here for that post) as well as Vegan Gingersnaps (a terrific cookie that I’ll be posting very soon, thanks to the Cozy Vegan from Calgary, Canada).

RAINBOW CHOCOLATE BARK

Ingredients:

Directions:

Cut up chocolate with sharp knife on cutting board. Place half the chocolate in glass bowl and microwave on high for 1 minute, stir and microwave for another 30 seconds. Stir again. If not fully melted, place in microwave for 30 more seconds (a total of 2 minutes). Throw remaining chocolate in bowl and stir until all chocolate is melted.

Pour warm melted chocolate onto the center of a parchment-lined (or aluminum foil-lined) large sheet pan. With a rubber spatula, ease chocolate from center to sides of pan to about 1/8″ thickness.

Be sure to chop any ingredients that need prepping ahead of time (i.e. dried apricots). Immediately sprinkle on prepared toppings, either in rows or all mixed up and  evenly distributed.

Place pan in refrigerator until it sets, about 30-40 minutes. If time is of the essence, place in freezer for about 20 minutes. Break bark into pieces and share!

FBLAers set up.

One good-looking table.

  I love FBLA

And here for your holiday gift from FBLA are links to all the recipes.  Go to it and enjoy!

FBLA 2013 Cookie Exchange Recipes

• Chai Tea Cookies — Cathy Arkle of She Paused 4 Thought (She also got tired of rolling the dough and refashioned the rest into Baby Hedgehog cookies.)
• Butter Pecan Fudge — Dorothy Reinhold (me!) from Shockingly Delicious.
• Antioxidant Chocolate Bark — Erika Kerekes (our hostess) of In Erika’s Kitchen.
• Sweet Potato Marshmallow Bars with White Chocolate Chips — Jennifer Richmond of Kitchy Cooking.
• Chocolate Chip and Apricot Walnut Rugelach and Vegan Chocolate Mini Cupcakes (“Naughty & Nice Cookies”) — Dana of Foodie Goes Healthy
• Vintage Sponge Drops with Double Fudge Filling — Leslie Macchiarella of Bake This Cake.
• Sicilian Christmas cookies — Judy Lyness of Two Broads Abroad.
• Cranberry Orange Walnut Sugar Cookies — Patricia Rose of Fresh Food in a Flash.
• Brown Butter Praline Chocolate Chip Cookies — Valentina Wein of Cooking On The Weekends.
• Mini Chocolate Nut Sandwich Cookies — Kelly Page of Tasting Page.
• Rosemary Raisin Cocktail Shortbread — Sharon Graves of Cheesy Pennies.
• Saketini Christmas Balls, Chocolate Macarons with Japanese Wine Cream Centers, and Matcha Green Tea Cookies with Chocolate Centers & Espresso Cookies with Caramel Fillings — Kim Watkinson of Ninja Baking.
• Blueberry Coconut Mini Cupcakes, Rainbow Chocolate Bark, and Vegan Gingersnaps — Judy Weintraub of Bumbleberry Breeze.
• Chocolate-Dipped Apricots with Pistachios — Adair Seldon of Lentil Breakdown.
• Spumoni Shortbread — Nancy Rose Eisman of Adventures with Nancy Rose.
• Crispy Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies and Cardamom Gingersnap Cookies — Alison Ashton of Nourish Network .
• Gluten-Free Pumpkin Oat Bars — Alanna Waldron of Eats Real Food.
• Red Velvet Gooey Butter Cookies — Tanaya Ghosh of Tanaya’s Table. (Tanaya’s Table, the blog, will launch in 2014.)
• Black and White Cookies — Tina Kil. (Her blog isn’t up yet, but watch for her contributions in the future!)

Non-Cookie Items

• Chiang Mai Chicken in Endive Spears — Cathy Arkle of She Paused 4 Thought.
• Seasonal salad — Nancy Rose Eisman of Adventures with Nancy Rose.
• Barrel-Aged Sazerac — Jennifer Richmond of Kitchy Cooking.