Triple Choc Bites- a No-Bake Refrigerator Cake

Bite-sized sweet treats...

...Perfect for a birthday bonfire party!

These are not vegan (although they could easily be vegan-ised- think dark chocolate with orangey peel or essence) and certainly not free of sugar, so apologies if you read my blog for healthy vegan recipes and information:  you can always click here, here or here for some more wholesome festive bakes...

I should explain that although myself and my husband follow a vegan diet of late, our kids are pure vegetarian, meaning they don't eat meat, fish or eggs, but they do eat dairy products at times. I was asked to make this for my stepson's 16th birthday party, which is to be tonight (Tuesday) and I thought they would also be good to submit to Chandrani's event at her yummy space Cuisine Delights as she is spotlighting festival food until November, and this simple recipe would certainly go down really well at any celebration. It is a tradition in my family to make this no-bake cake on November 5th, for the English "Bonfire Night."

So without further ado, here's the recipe:

250g milk chocolate digestive biscuits

100g margarine or butter

150g golden syrup

2 tabs cocoa powder

100g raisins

300g white chocolate

a little cocoa powder for dusting

• Crush the biscuits in a plastic bag with a rolling pin (stop before they turn into crumbs; leave some small pieces.
• Melt the butter/ margarine, syrup and cocoa powder together over a gentle heat. 
• Stir in the biscuits and raisins.
• Spread evenly into a buttered, foil-lined baking tray and press down to a depth of about 1cm. I found that the quantities given here will not quite fill a standard Swiss roll tin.
• Put in the freezer to firm up, but remove before it actually freezes.
• Meanwhile, break up and melt the white chocolate in a bowl over a pan of hot water. Beat until smooth.
• Spread the chocolate carefully over the fridge cake and dust with a little cocoa powder, as shown in the picture.
• Return to the freezer to set, but when the chocolate is about half set, mark out the little bite-sized squares as the chocolate tends to crack if you try to cut it from scratch once fully set.
• Once set, remove from freezer and store in the fridge.

A note about chocolate: If you are using any other chocolate apart from white chocolate, you may get a whitish "bloom" on the surface if you let it go from hot to very cold too suddenly. This doesn't affect the taste, just the look.