I have written before about the chocolate bar of my childhood, the famed milk chocolate filled with rum fondant, and how much I still love that chocolate rum combination to this day. These little bars feature just that fantastic blend, with a perhaps unexpected ingredient as their base - chickpeas.
They are incredibly versatile and useful in a whole array of recipes, sweet and savoury, and I love using them in desserts like these. Combined with chocolate, cocoa powder, and rum, they are simply blended into a smooth paste, mixed with a few more ingredients, and left to set. As simple as that.
I love how flexible these bars are, and how adaptable the recipe itself is. You can add more icing sugar if you like your bars sweeter, you can replace the sugar altogether with 5-6 Medjool dates, or you can use maple syrup or even vegan honey, and add a bit more of ground biscuits, to make the batter pliable.
You can add a teaspoon or two of rum extract, to enhance the flavour, or if you do not want to use alcohol at all, replace the quantity stated in the recipe with almond milk and simply add the rum flavouring to taste. They will be delicious either way.
Ingredients
250 grams cooked chickpeas
100 grams dark chocolate (at least 60% cocoa solids)
100 grams vegan block butter
120 grams icing sugar, sifted
½ teaspoon vanilla bean paste
50 millilitres dark rum
15 grams unsweetened cocoa powder
150 grams finely ground almonds
100 grams vegan vanilla biscuits, finely ground
Preparation
Start by draining the chickpeas very well from aquafaba, and placing them in a blender. Melt together the dark chocolate and the vegan butter, either over low heat or in the microwave, and set them aside for a moment, to cool down.
Add the icing sugar, vanilla, and rum to the chickpeas, and let the blender run until a smooth, fragrant paste forms. Add in the cocoa powder, and blend well. At this point, there should not be any visible bits of chickpeas left.
Add in the melted and cooled chocolate, and blend until smooth. Transfer the batter to a large bowl and add in the ground almonds. Mix and fold with a wooden spoon or a spatula until all the almonds are mixed through. Finally, add in the ground vanilla biscuits in a few additions, mixing and folding after each addition. If the batter looks very soft, you can add a bit more biscuits, but do not overdo it, as they will be tough after cooling.
Line a small square cake pan (15x15 for taller bars or 18x18 for slightly shorter ones) with baking parchment and gently press in and level the batter. Place the pan into the refrigerator for at least 4 hours, or until firm and set. Slice into 36 squares or the desired number of bars, and serve.
