This delicious holiday food trend is finally coming to this corner of the internet! Woo hoo! It has taken longer than I hoped to put this guide together, but it is chock full of resources for making the ultimate vegan hot chocolate bombs. The best non-dairy cocoa mixes, resources for vegan marshmallows, the perfect chocolate to use for glistening shells, chocolate tempering- everything you will need to whip up your own cups of cocoa goodness.
I have had the pleasure of making and distributing several batches of these via distanced curbside dropoff to my loved ones this holiday season and they have been a universal hit! This is a wonderful way to gift someone a cozy holiday treat to enjoy while we are celebrating this very…different kind of Christmas. When I sit down with a cup of cocoa, I am reminded of this quote:
A cup of kindness that we share with another, a sweet reunion with a friend or a brother, in all the places you find love, it feels like Christmas!
The Muppets in “A Muppet Christmas Carol”
And no, I am not sitting on the couch crying over my umpteenth viewing of A Muppet Christmas Carol.
Well, maybe I am. Shh.
But to my point, these hot chocolate bombs are truly a way to share a cup of kindness with those we love this year. And it is easy as ever to make them dairy free and vegan so everybody can enjoy them!
Making Vegan Hot Chocolate Bombs: It All Starts With Chocolate
There are a lot of tutorials for cocoa bombs out there, but I notice a lot of them do typically leave out a fairly important step in the chocolate-making process: tempering. What is tempering? It is the process of heating and cooling chocolate to specific temperatures, allowing the cocoa butter crystals within the chocolate to perfectly align. This is what gives chocolate confections their glistening exterior, their satisfying snap, and what allows chocolate to set and become hard quickly without needing to chill in the refrigerator (Fun Fact: refrigerating chocolate can actually lead to your chocolate shells becoming dull and losing that gorgeous chocolate luster. Temper your chocolate to avoid this!)
We are going to touch on the chocolate tempering process ever-so briefly. I am not an expert, but I will share what technique has worked the best for me. I will talk about my process in brief, but bear in mind that I am no chocolate expert. This post will include links to several other in-depth tempering resources written by those who know their way around chocolate to help guide you on your chocolate journey!
A Quick Lesson: Kinds of Chocolate
There are two kinds of chocolate out there that I’m going to talk about: coverture chocolate and compound chocolate.
Coverture chocolate contains solely cocoa butter and chocolate liquor. It has a very high percentage of cocoa butter, which makes it melt and pour smoothly. This is why pastry chefs use it for things like molding, which is what we are doing with these hot chocolate bombs!
Compound chocolate (sometimes referred to as “fake” chocolate) typically contains cocoa powder and other kinds of fats or emulsifiers, like lecithin and vegetable oil.
One kind of chocolate is not better than another. They are both good, but serve different purposes! Coverture chocolate requires tempering where compound chocolate does not. Candy melts that you can purchase in the craft store? Compound chocolate.
Compound chocolate is much easier to work with because of the additives. The chocolate sets without as much work on the part of the chef. That said, 99.9% of coverture chocolates are vegan!
Can I use chocolate chips? The short answer is yes, but the lower percentage of cocoa butter in chocolate chips means your shells with be far less shiny.
For this recipe, I will be using coverture chocolate. Info about purchasing coverture chocolate (along with the materials I use for tempering) will be a little further down.
For more information about different kinds of chocolate, check out this article from The Kitchn!
How I Temper My Chocolate
There are three main ways that chocolate can be tempered:
- Tabling (typically done by experienced pastry chefs, so I won’t discuss this one)
- Seeding with unmelted chocolate (much easier for the home cook, but not the technique I use!)
- Seeding using freeze dried cocoa butter- this is what I do!
At the suggestion of Anne Reardon of How To Cook That, I ordered a product called Mycryo off of Amazon. The freeze dried cocoa butter crystals in this product, when added to melted chocolate at an appropriate temperature, will aid in the perfect tempering of your chocolate.
How To Use Mycryo When Tempering Chocolate: This tutorial from Lili’s Cakes is incredible, and includes both texts and a hand-drawn comic to explain the process!
I know I know. You came here for vegan hot chocolate bomb and not a lesson on tempering. Yes, yes, I hear you! How To Cook that has a blog post with accompanying YouTube video all about the different tempering techniques, along with written guides. She is an expert. I’m not. Use her tempering resources and come back when you’re ready! Ready? Okay, go.
Putting Together The Vegan Hot Chocolate Bombs
Alright, we’ve had a crash course in chocolate. Now it’s time to make the bombs. For this recipe, you will need a few things. The list below includes what I used along with alternatives and some places to purchase! Note: These are not affiliate links, just resources that I have found helpful!
Ingredients
- Chocolate. Again, coverture chocolate. Most coverture chocolates are vegan and can be purchased both at Amazon and on websites like World Wide Chocolate.
- Vegan hot chocolate mix
- Swiss Miss non-dairy cocoa mix
- Good & Gather (Target brand) cocoa mixes are vegan! – This is what I used
- Go Dairy Free has an extensive list of additional dairy-free cocoa mixes, many of which are also vegan.
- Vegan mini marshmallows
- Dandies: My go-to for vegan marshmallows! They are becoming available and more and more mainstream grocery stores here in the US.
- Trader Joes: As of the time of this writing, both the full-size and mini versions of the marshmallows at Trader Joes are vegan! That said, they are seasonal and not always available.
- Vegan white chocolate for drizzling and decorate the exteriors of your chocolate bombs.
- Pascha Chocolate: This is my favorite vegan white chocolate simply because of its neutral-sweet flavor and fabulous consistency when melted.
- King David: I have not tried this brand, but the internet tells me that it is a commonly used alternative among vegan bakers!
- Vegan Candy Canes, Sprinkles, Miscellaneous Candies
- Fancy Sprinkles: These are vegan AND adorable!
- Wilton: Commonly available in craft and grocery stores. Some, but not all, of their sprinkles are vegan. Be sure to double check the ingredients!
- Vegan Dollhouse has an extensive vegan sprinkle list that includes the above brands and SO many more.
Tools
- Round silicone molds: I purchased these from Amazon.
- Double boiler: this is a fancy way of saying a small saucepan with a bowl that fits over it. This is for melting your chocolate and keeping it warm while you work.
- Laser (or probe) thermometer: For making sure you keep your chocolate at the appropriate temperatures while working, and for tempering. I find this kind of thermometer to be more accurate and faster than a traditional candy thermometer.
- Medium-sized paintbrushes: I used plain old craft brushes. They don’t need to be fancy!
- A microwave-safe plate: You’ll see why.
The Procedure
Lay out your silicone molds over waxed paper. You’ll probably drip a lot of chocolate, and that is completely fine! Have your paintbrushes nearby. Once the chocolate is ready, you have to work quickly!
- In a double boiler, melt your chocolate and heat to between 104 degrees and 113 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Remove your chocolate from the heat and allow it to cool to 95 degrees F.
- At this temperature, add Mycryo (1% by weight of chocolate) and stir thoroughly to incorporate.
- Allow the chocolate to continue to cool until it reaches 88-89 degrees F. Now your chocolate is ready to use!
Painting The Chocolate Molds
Okay, you have tempered chocolate. Congrats! Now it’s time to mold your chocolate. One chocolate mold at add 1/2 tablespoon of melted chocolate. Using the paintbrush, paint the chocolate up the sides of the mold, coating as thoroughly as you can. This layer will be thin, and that is alright! You’ll do another one soon.
Repeat painting 1/2 tablespoon of melted chocolate into each mold.
Wait several minutes for these first layers to set. Properly tempered chocolate should set within five to seven minutes and not need to go in the refrigerator.
Once the chocolate is hard, paint another 1/2 tablespoon layer of chocolate into each shell. Let rest for ten to fifteen minutes, just to ensure the shells are solid.
Gently, gently, gently, turn out your molds.
As you can see from the above images, I lost a shell because I rushed and crushed one of the molds with my hand. Don’t be me. Slow and steady wins the race with this one.
You can gently (you’ll see this word a LOT when it comes to working with this chocolate) brush away the excess chocolate that dried along the edges of the shell. Just peel it away with your fingers!
Now, flip half of your molds upside down and FILL! This is the fun part.
Each half-shell gets one tablespoon of cocoa mix followed by whatever toppings you like! I leave some plain, add marshmallows to others, and sometimes I go crazy and add in some crushed up candy canes!
Sealing The Hot Chocolate Bombs
There are many different complicated ways of doing this all over the internet involving piping chocolate and using knives and various tools. In my world, we only need one tool: a plate.
Take a regular old plate and warm it in the microwave for 30 seconds.
Place an empty, unfilled shell on the warm plate and move it around for a few seconds, just until the chocolate at the edges of the shell begins to melt.
Next, flip your plate upside down and hold it so you can raise a filled shell up to the plate to melt those shell edges also.
Finally, carefully press the filled and unfilled shell halves together and run your finger over the edge to smooth it out.
Boom. Now you have filled and sealed vegan hot chocolate bombs. Now let’s make ’em pretty.
PRO TIP: If you make more than one kind of chocolate bomb at once, LABEL THEM BEFORE YOU SEAL THEM! Put post it notes on your counter or sort them in some way. The first time I made these, I definitely lost count of which hot chocolate bombs had which fillings inside.
Making ‘Em Pretty
Microwave your vegan white chocolate in a small dish for thirty seconds. because this is just for decoration, I do not worry so much about tempering.
Using a spoon, drizzle the white chocolate over the tops of each hot chocolate bomb.
Before this chocolate has time to dry, top with whatever sprinkle combination you like. I decorated based on what was inside so I could keep better track of which bombs were which. Because I’m a hot mess that will forget after about five seconds.
Take a minute and look at those. LOOK AT THEM. You did that, my friend. You made those. Aren’t they cute? Don’t they just make you so stinkin’ happy? Be proud of yourself!
Last but certainly not least, grab some cookies. These or these will do. Place one of your gorgeous creations in a mug and pour a cup of extra hot non-dairy milk over the chocolate bomb.
Stir vigorously.
Enjoy. Really enjoy.
Vegan Hot Chocolate Bombs
Equipment
- Double boiler
- Laser thermometer
- Round, 2.5" silicone molds
- Medium-sized paintbrushes
- Microwave-safe plate
Ingredients
- 250 grams (~1 ½ cups) dark coverture chocolate chopped small
- 2 ½ teaspoons Mycryo/freeze dried cocoa butter
- 6 tablespoons vegan hot cocoa mix
- 30 grams vegan white chocolate
- vegan mini marshmallows to taste
- sprinkles, crushed candy canes, other decoration optional
Instructions
Tempering The Chocolate
- In a double boiler, melt your chocolate and heat to between 104 degrees and 113 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Remove your chocolate from the heat and allow it to cool to 95 degrees F.
- At this temperature, add Mycryo (1% by weight of chocolate) and stir thoroughly to incorporate.
- Allow the chocolate to continue to cool until it reaches 88-89 degrees F. Now your chocolate is ready to use!
Making The Chocolate Shells
- Filling one chocolate mold at a time, add 1/2 tablespoon of melted chocolate. Using the paintbrush, paint the chocolate up the sides of the mold, coating as thoroughly as you can. This first layer will be thin.
- Let the chocolate set. This should take between 5 and 7 minutes.
- Repeat the process of painting 1/2 tablespoon of melted chocolate into each mold.
- Gently turn out the molds onto a piece of parchment paper.
Filling The Chocolate Shells
- Fill half of your chocolate shells with 1 tablespoon of cocoa mix each, plus any additional marshmallows or candy toppings you want.
Sealing The Hot Chocolate Bombs
- Warm a plate in the microwave for 20 to 30 seconds.
- Repeat painting 1/2 tablespoon of melted chocolate into each mold.
- Next, flip your plate upside down and hold it so you can raise a filled shell up to the plate to melt those shell edges also.
- Finally, carefully press the filled and unfilled shell halves together and run your finger over the edge to smooth it out.
Decorating The Hot Chocolate Bombs
- Microwave your vegan white chocolate in a small dish for thirty seconds.
- Using a spoon, drizzle the white chocolate over the tops of each hot chocolate bomb.
- Before this chocolate has time to dry, top with whatever sprinkle combination you like.
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