Chocolate Caramel Mallomars

One of my favorite restaurants is Pure Food and Wine in New York City.  They make a raw food mallomar dessert that is really delicious.  Rather than try to copy their version, I wanted to make something that was a little more accessible, since most people don’t have dehydrators.  This is a vegan treat made with a chocolate wafer base and Ricemellow creme filling.  Ricemellow is a vegan marshmallow creme that is egg, fat, gluten, cholesterol and additive free.  I like that it’s sweetened with brown rice syrup rather than sugar or corn syrup. 

I started with a chocolate cookie dough. You want to roll the dough out fairly thin, about 1/8 of an inch thick so that the wafer base will crisp up when baked.

Once the chocolate wafers have cooled you put a teaspoon of ricemellow creme on each one.  You don’t need a lot, this stuff is very sweet.  You need to refrigerate it ahead of time.  It will hold it’s shape and not melt off the cookie if it’s cold.  Pop them in your freezer for an hour or more to firm up.

Then you drizzle them with melted bittersweet chocolate.  I used ScharffenBerger.  You’ll want to put them back in the freezer so that the chocolate forms a hard shell.

I could have stopped there but I got carried away.  I had some caramel sauce in my refrigerator left over from another dessert, so I warmed that up and drizzled some on top of the chocolate.  These are very rich, very sweet.  You might be temped to eat more than one, but I suggest you resist the temptation...I’m talking from experience...

Chocolate Caramel Mallomars

Makes 18 servings - Use organic ingredients whenever possible

4 tablespoons non hydrogenated butter substitute (I used Earth Balance)

1/4 cup sugar

2 tablespoons almond milk (or other non-dairy milk)

3/4 cup unbleached all purpose flour

1/3 cup cocoa powder

1/8 teaspoon baking soda

1/8 teaspoon salt

14 oz container Ricemellow creme

9 oz bittersweet chocolate (I used ScharffenBerger)

Your favorite caramel sauce (optional)

Preheat your oven to 325°

Refrigerate the Ricemellow creme.

Cream the butter substitute and sugar until light and creamy.

Add the almond milk and beat until blended.

Whisk together the flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt.

Stir into the butter mixture.

Form the dough into a disc, wrap in plastic and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Roll out the dough to an 1/8 inch thick and cut out cookies.  (you can re-roll the scraps)

Bake for 14 minutes and allow to cool completely.

Drop about a teaspoon of Ricemellow on each cookie and put them in the freezer for at least an hour.

Melt the chocolate in a double boiler (or bowl over a pot of water)

Using a teaspoon, drizzle the chocolate over the Ricemellow by pouring it off the end of the spoon.

Put the mallomars back in the freezer for 10 minutes to harden up

Repeat using your favorite heated caramel sauce and return to the freezer.

Store the mallowmars in your freezer until you’re ready to eat them.