Chocolate Fudge

Thought you had to give up the chocolaty goodness of fudge this year to help reach your goals? Hah! The beauty of this recipe is that it starts as an easy to make simple chocolate fudge. To make it your own you just start adding variations. You like your fudge to have bits of fruit or nuts in it? Add them in at the end. Want a different flavour with your chocolate? Play with extracts. Want that sweet and salty fun? Top it with some flaked sea salt before serving. You see the kind of fun you can have? I’m thinking of serving some of this with some cherries mixed before refrigeration for valentine’s day. Mmmmm.

• 300 ml low fat sweetened condensed milk
• 285 grams extra dark chocolate, chopped up
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1. Spray and line a 9 inch baking pan with plastic wrap, allow a few inches of plastic wrap to hang over the two edges of the pan.
2. Pour the condensed milk, vanilla, and chocolate into a saucepan. Stir and cook over medium-low heat until the chocolate melts and everything becomes smooth. Watch this process carefully, you don’t want to ruin a good pan or fudge.
3. Pour into the prepared pan and spread evenly. Allow to cool, pull the overhang over to cover your fudge lightly. Refrigerate overnight.
4. The next day, uncover your fudge, remove the block from the pan using the over hangs as handles. Place upside down on a cutting board and remove the plastic wrap. Cut 5 strips horizontally and 9 strips vertically. I like mine to be more like strips of fudge rather than squares. Stack on a serving plate, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Makes 45 slices of fudge. Each serving contains 65 calories, 3 grams of fat and 1 gram of fibre. Delicious! Careful, these are easy to overindulge in if they are sitting in front of you minding their own business. Poor unsuspecting fudge.  I suggest only taking out what you know you can have and forgetting about the rest. This keeps in the fridge for a couple weeks so it’s easy to do and keep on hand as an extra special treat.