Vegetable Cacao Nib-Nibbles – We Should Cocoa
I’ve been watching the We Should Cocoa from the back seats for a while now. This month the gauntlet was well and truly thrown down as the challenge was to make something savoury and vegetarian. You’d think I’d decide to join in on an easy month. You’d be wrong.
So, after a swift text to my cacao nib dealer (a friend who works at Hotel Chocolat ‘s Rabot Estate shop) and a rifle through my cupboard to find a Schwarz “Cook Art chilli and cocoa bean blend” that I had been given last Christmas and was still sealed (sorry Sarah) I began to put my thinking cap on.
- The beginnings
I had several ideas. Possibly more of that in tomorrow. It depends if they work.
In the meantime how about some Vegetable Cacao-Nib Nibbles?
One of your five a day AND it includes chocolate
Beetroot and Butternut Squash Crunchy Cacao-Nib Nibbles
Invented by me, inspired by many
beetroot, cubed
butternut Squash, cubed
1 egg, lightly beaten breadcrumbs
a handful of cacao nibs
A few tablespoons of plain flour, seasoned
Schwarz Cook Art chilli and cocoa bean blend (or some cocoa powder and chilli powder mixed together)
First grate your bread and toast it to make breadcrumbs. Do as I say, not as I do and make them nice and fine so that they stick better.
Put some plain flour mixed with the Schwarz spice into a shallow tuppaware
Crush the cacao-nibs with your rolling pin until as small as possible. Mix with the breadcrumbs and put the mix in another shallow tuppaware
Taking each vegetable cube follow the production line of…
- roll in flour mix
- dunk in the beaten egg
- roll in the breadcrumb / cacao nib mix
- Beetroot, butternut squash and breadcrumbs (which should be smaller)
- Crushing the cacao nibs
- Crunchy Cacao Nib-Nibbles
They sound fantastic and what a brilliantly original recipe. The chilli would go really well with the squash and the chocolate with the beetroot – I strongly suspect I’d love them. What did you think?
What a brilliant idea!! I’d love to try them 🙂
What a clever idea, would never have thought of that. I can imagine the sweetness of those vegetables would go really well with chocolate.
Thanks Janice. I think Cacao nibs are sneaking to the top of my favourite ingredients list. Not so easy to get hold of though.