Chocolate Crunch Squares
Recipe: Simple and special treat
Makes about 16 pieces (18cm tray)
Preparation time 20 minutes
Setting time about 2 hours in the fridge
Ingredients 110g butter/ 1 tbsp golden syrup/ 20ml drinking chocolate powder (You can alternatively use cocoa powder)/ 16 digestive biscuit (226g) / 170g cooking chocolate (unsweetened chocolate)
Measuring terminology: tbsp=tablespoon (15ml)/ tsp=teaspoon (5ml)
1 Put the digestive biscuits into a polythene bag (ziplock bag) and crush with a rolling pin. It is better to crush the biscuits into pieces that are large enough to give it some texture rather than making it too powdery.
2 Melt the butter in a saucepan over low heat, then turn off the heat add the drinking chocolate powder and golden syrup, and stir everything together.
3 Add the crushed biscuits into the saucepan, mixing in thoroughly.
4 Line the base of a baking tray with baking paper. The ideal size of tray is about 18cm square and 3cm deep. Tip the biscuit crumb mixture into the tin. Using the back of a spoon, spread out the mixture until you have a flat and even base, pressing it down firmly all over. (Press the edges and corners equally as well.)
5 Break the cooking chocolate into small pieces, add to a saucepan and stir well over a gentle heat to melt.
6 Pour the melted chocolate onto the biscuit base and spread evenly.
7 After cooling, put the tray into the fridge and leave it until the base is set for about 2 hours. Use a long knife to cut the chocolate crunch square into about 3cm sized pieces when it is set.
If you don’t have golden syrup, you can use 40g of caster sugar instead of golden syrup. When you melt the cooking chocolate, it is best to break it into small pieces then melt it on the lowest possible heat so it won’t have any lumps. I made the chocolate crunch squares with twice the quantity of ingredients and I used a 20cm x 30cm tin. For the chocolate topping I used half dark cooking chocolate and half milk cooking chocolate. After the base has completely hardened, carefully cut the chocolate square with a long knife, so as not to crush the biscuit part. When storing, cut the used baking paper to the size of the container and lay one sheet on top of each layer, so it does not stick together when you take it out to eat.
My family usually makes chocolate crunch squares on Christmas Eve, so it can harden overnight at room temperature. Since it is cold in the winter, it doesn’t need to be put in the fridge and we eat it as a dessert on Christmas Day. Chocolate tastes best when eaten at room temperature because if it has been in the fridge then it changes the texture. However, when you make something with melted chocolate, I think the only solution is to use the fridge.
I made chocolate crunch squares, wrapped them up beautifully, and brought them to my cousin-in-law's house. They really enjoyed it! Not only is this recipe delicious, but you can't go wrong with it. I think it is ideal to prepare it as a hand-made gift. Feel free to give them a try.
The chocolate crunch squares are not a traditional treat, so they don’t have a history of their own. It is said that the name is also one of the names that my other half (who loves chocolate) came up with while baking with his grandmother when he was young. The chocolate crunch squares are memories of my grandmother-in-law and are much loved by my family as a Christmas treat.
Most children start reception class at school full-time in September after their fourth birthday. My husband spent most of the time before starting school with his grandparents because his parents both worked. He usually did gardening or DIY with his grandfather, and he did baking with his grandmother. My husband teaches me how to bake in the same way he learned from his grandmother using his grandmother’s recipes. There are many photos of him as a happy little boy doing something with his grandmother and grandfather. He has lots of memories with his grandparents, so he still has many moments that remind him of them.
The history of chocolate dates back over 5,000 years. It is unclear when chocolate was first consumed, but there is evidence of Mesoamerican groups drinking an alcoholic drink made by fermenting the pulp from around the cacao seeds. Cacao was extremely important; considered a gift from the gods, it was used as a currency as well as medicinally and ceremonially.
Columbus was disappointed to learn that these cacao beans were the local currency rather than the gold he coveted! However, in time Europeans came to realise just how valuable and delicious these beans could be.
Sam Bilton explains about chocolate, its culture and history in an extract from ‘The History of Chocolate’ article below.
Whilst the Spanish, French and Italians embraced this new drink, the English lagged behind in their enthusiasm. There is an account of English pirates seizing a Spanish cargo of cocoa beans in 1579. Assuming the beans to be sheep droppings, and having no idea of their value, they torched the lot. It would not be until 1655, when the English took Jamaica and its cacao plantations from the Spanish that the habit of drinking chocolate would take hold in this country. The English made their chocolate with water or milk, sugar egg yolks and often with a slug of brandy or sack (a type of sherry) for good measure! It was also drunk out of small dishes rather than cups (like that other popular beverage of the day, tea).
During the 16th century the Spanish were quick to harness the labour of the indigenous people of the Americas. Disease and maltreatment of the local people had a catastrophic impact on the native population. It is estimated that only 10 percent of the original population of the Americas were still alive by the end of the 17th century. The answer was to import slaves from the African continent to work on the cacao plantations. Thousands of Africans were shipped to the Caribbean and the Americas as part of the ‘Three Way Trade’ system. This saw the human cargo being sold and exchanged for raw materials like cacao beans and cotton which would be shipped back to Europe and processed by industry into chocolate and textiles.
The discovery of forastero cacao, a lower quality but more productive form of the cacao bean from Ecuador than the criollo variety originally found in Mexico and Guatemala, would see dramatic changes in how chocolate was produced. An enslaved workforce and higher yields meant chocolate could be produced more cost effectively (the same would be true of sugar). In the early 19th century the Portuguese began transplanting forastero cuttings to their colonies in Africa. By the early 20th century cacao plantations were widely established in Nigeria, the Gold Cost and the Ivory Coast. It is somewhat ironic that the majority of the world’s cacao beans are now grown in African countries where so much of the enforced labour for the Americas was sourced. For many years Fry & Sons boycotted cacao beans from Portuguese West African plantations in protest against the poor working conditions endured by the workers.
