Recipe: Dark Chocolate-Covered Popcorn Balls

There aren’t many things that cannot be made better by chocolate. It’s my dessert of choice…my go-to for indulgent sweet fixes.  So whenever I’m dreaming up a recipe, it typically includes chocolate.

This weekend, families across the country will gather to watch and celebrate the best in football. Super Bowl weekend is quickly approaching and while we are not planning on hosting or attending a large celebration, I thought it might be fun to pick up some festive, healthy-ish snacks to watch the game.

We love popcorn, and most of the time, we make it ourselves because store-bought varieties contain artificial ingredients including colors and flavors.  However, when we’re pressed for time, we always opt for Popcorn Indiana because the company is committed to healthier, whole-grain snacking. One of their most popular snacking products is the Movie Theater Popcorn which comes in a microwave-safe warm-up bag. In addition to picking up a few bags of their popcorn, I also purchased a bag of pretzels and some Hershey Miniatures.

Now, we can simply enjoy the snacks as is (and my husband and two kids would be perfectly content). However, as I started dreaming up all of the things I could do with these (snack mixes readily came to mind), I decided to make popcorn balls.  And since chocolate makes everything better, why not dip them in Hershey’s Special Dark Chocolate?

Here is my recipe for Dark Chocolate-Covered Popcorn Balls:

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Recipe: Dark Chocolate-Covered Popcorn Balls

Ingredients

• 10 cups Popcorn Indiana Movie Theatre Popcorn
• 1/2 cup plus 2 Tablespoons butter
• 1/2 cup plus 2 Tablespoons Agave Nectar
• 1/4 + 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Hershey's Special Dark Miniatures
• Crushed Pretzels

Instructions

1. Melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat
2. Add in Agave nectar and salt
3. Boil approximately 1 minute
4. Stir in Vanilla
5. Pour mixture over popcorn and coat evenly
6. Bake popcorn mixture in a roasting pan at 325 degrees F for 25 minutes, stirring regularly
7. Remove from pan and allow to cool just enough to work with the popcorn
8. With greased or buttered hands, form into balls
9. Place on a wax paper-lined baking sheet and allow to cool completely
10. Melt dark chocolate in a double boiler
11. Dip each popcorn ball in the chocolate, then in the crushed pretzels
12. Allow to set

Since I am always striving to create healthy foods for my family, I opted for Agave Nectar in place of Corn Syrup (which is the traditional sweetener of choice for this dessert).  While admittedly, Agave Nectar is a bit more difficult to work with, the taste was incredible.

This recipe is seriously delicious. I absolutely love the merging of sweet and salty flavors and I still find that these popcorn balls satisfied my craving for crunchy snacks.

All of the ingredients used in this recipe can be purchased in the grocery section of your local Walmart.

 Images: Rockin’ Mama

Recipe: Adapted from MyRecipes.com

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Caryn Bailey

Caryn is a NICU nurse by day, blogger by night and mom 24/7. She savors the warm Southern California sun and loves to travel, shopping, baking, reading and frequenting her local tea room. Caryn created the column Lavishly Green for Peekaboo Picks Magazine to share her best tips for going green in style, she is the Former editor for Family Review Network, former OC Family Magazine online contributor, former Orange County Moms Blog contributor, former Evenflo Savvy Parent contributor, former member of the Totsy Advisory Board and former freelance writer for CBS Los Angeles.

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