allergy-friendly white chocolate (vegan, grain-free)

the base recipe comes via: https://community.kidswithfoodallergies.org/blog/how-to-make-dairy-free-white-chocolate

the author goes into much more detail, and has many more photos, so i suggest taking a little clicksee over there.  i copied just the bare minimum below.

i made mine with coconut flour, and blended plain granulated vegan sugar in my vitamix to avoid the starches that are usually in regular powdered sugar.  i also used 1/4 tsp of powdered vanilla in each batch (this is sold by spicely.  those little green boxes of spices)

i have a chocomaker melting pot, but you can use a double boiler if you're really careful not to get steam or condensation into your chocolate.  otherwise, it's probably best to follow the recipe's microwave directions.

the mint flavored chocolate was made with 4 drops of peppermint oil (not extract.  extract has water in it.  craft stores will carry pure chocolate flavoring oils)  then to make them grasshoppers / andes candies, i melted some 69% dark chocolate from enjoy life and filled the molds the rest of the way.

the pumpkin spice chocolate had 1/8 t. cloves and 1/4 t each of nutmeg, allspice, ginger, and 1/2 t. of ceylon cinnamon (if you don't have ceylon, use only 1/4 t. of what you have.  ceylon is very mild and soft.)

i also dehydrated about 1/2 cup of canned pumpkin until dry and crispy.  i blended this with the sugar in my vitamix, but it didn't blend completely. (apologies if you got a hard bit of pumpkin in your chocolate) 

if i make this again, i will mix the pumpkin with the sugar before dehydrating to see if it blends better.

NOTE: to those who want to take a shortcut without using powdered sugar. don't dump granulated sugar into your cocoa butter. even caster sugar isn't fine enough.  sugar melts at 320 F, and you don't want your cocoa butter getting that hot.  (this means your sugar will be grainy if you dump anything with a tiny bit of graininess in there.)

TOP 8 FREE WHITE CHOCOLATE
Ingredients
4 ounces food grade cocoa butter
1 cup powdered sugar
pinch of salt
2 tsp coconut flour OR rice flour OR rice milk powder
1/3 of a vanilla bean

WARNING: Don’t get water in your chocolate. Not even from the ingredients.

Directions
Use a scale to measure your cocoa butter, and then chop it into small pieces. Cocoa butter takes longer to melt than ready-made chocolate, so the smaller your pieces, the faster your job will be.
Place your cocoa butter into a microwave safe bowl and heat for 30 second intervals at 50% power. Stir every time before heating more—just like with regular chocolate, you don’t want to burn it (ask me how I know.)

You’re going to want to temper your white chocolate, and you can’t seed it this time. The easiest way I found to do this was to heat the cocoa butter and then allow the other ingredients to cool it down, and then heat the entire concoction up a bit more before pouring. So once your cocoa butter is fully melted, use a thermometer to check its temperature. Continue heating it at 50% power for 20 or 30 second intervals until the cocoa butter reaches a temperature of 120°F.

While your cocoa butter is melting, use a paring knife to split your vanilla bean in half.
Place each half on a cutting board, use one finger to hold the narrow end of the bean down, and use the blunt edge of the paring knife to gently scrape the vanilla seeds out of the pod. Repeat with the other half.

Once the cocoa butter has reached the correct temperature, add the salt, coconut/rice flour, and vanilla seeds and mix to incorporate.

Gradually add your sugar and mix until smooth. You’ll want to use a small whisk or fork, and get out all the lumps.

Once you’re done, check the temperature again. Ideally, you’d like it to get down to about 79°F before carefully heating it back up to about 87°F.

You are now ready to pour your chocolate into molds.