Who’s ready for another blast from the past? It’s been unseasonably warm in my corner of the globe for the last several days, and the last thing I’ve felt like doing is heating up my oven and heating the house up even further. So as I was flipping through my pages, I realized that this recipe called for absolutely zero oven baking and immediately dubbed it the winner by default. To add to it’s list of winning qualities, this recipe calls for just a few simple ingredients, very little prep effort, and can satisfy both a salty and a sweet craving. Plus, you’ll get a dose of history at the same time! Are you sold yet? Let’s try it out!
Everyone has been rocking the other vintage posts in my collection, so it’s high time for a third entry in the series. Both of the previous recipes ( click here for Chocolate Bits and click here for Chocolate Honeys) call for chocolate in chunk form, but in this recipe we’ll be melting it down and making a fully chocolate confection! But because this treat is getting mixed with salty cracker bits and then rolled in lightly salted nuts, there’s a wonderful balance struck between the two tastes. It’s pretty impressive in it’s simplicity- there’s something to be said for a little old school baking!
First, because I can never resist, let’s have a bit of a history lesson. If you’re coming to this post via a link from another of my vintage recipes, please accept my apologies for the repetition! I started this series when my grandmother mailed me an envelope full of recipes belonging to my great grandmother that she had collected during WWII. As a history major, I was immediately intrigued and as a baker, I knew I had to try them all. The fun of these particular recipes is that they were all created to work with the rationing guidelines established by the United States government during the war- which meant there was very little butter, sugar, eggs, and other things we would consider modern day staples available per person to purchase at the store. Shoppers would be issued coupons redeemable (along with payment) for a certain amount of a rationed good, and the rationale- forgive the pun– was that by preemptively limiting consumers from overbuying a particular item, it would prevent hoarding and there would be less stress when inevitable shortages occurred.
Alright, let’s head back to modern day and talk about chocolate for a moment! This is another recipe authored by Rockwood & Co, a company that was a huge supplier of chocolate during wartime but has since, sadly, gone the way of the Dodo. Since it’s no longer around for me to sample, I had to chose my chocolate based on my grandmother’s recollections of her mother making these recipes. She remembered a chocolate that was not quite unsweetened, but certainly with a high cacao percentage. Normal semi-sweet chocolate is about 60% cacao, so I wanted to use something greater than that. My favorite is 65%, but if that isn’t available in your area I would suggest you up your percentage to 70% for your first try rather than round down to 60%. The recipe card also says you should use ‘one package’ of chocolate, which is a little less than helpful when it doesn’t exist anymore. In this particular recipe, I used 1 1/2 cups of 65% chocolate.
To build on the chocolate, a word about melting it: this recipe calls for the use of a double boiler. While this is a pretty standard baking staple, if you don’t have one, don’t despair. Use two regular saucepans, where one can fit on top of the other with a gap in between for steam to rise up, or use an oven-safe bowl resting on top of a saucepan. I do not recommend you use a microwave in this particular recipe because you’ll want to continue to keep your mixture warm even after you remove it from the heat source, which isn’t possible if you’re using a microwave. So please trust me, and use some sort of double boiler set up here.
Most of this recipe I kept exactly the same, with some minor amendments and notes after my first attempt. Now that I’ve settled into a recipe that I like, I’ll share those notes with you and you can choose how much of the recipe you’d like to modify and how much you’d like to retain. My adaptation is what’s written in the recipe below, so follow what is in the picture above if you want to be 100% as written by Rockwood. First, I changed the almond extract to vanilla extract- I found the almond a bit overpowering, but if you are a fan of almonds in general I am sure you’d find it wonderful as written. Second, I use regular salted Saltines in my Gems- the first time I went for authenticity and used unsalted crackers but that seemed to leave everything a touch bland. Thirdly, the recipe calls for ‘nutmeats’, which is wildly unspecific and possibly so on purpose, so use whatever nuts you have on hand that you can crush small. I used lightly salted cocktail peanuts because that’s what my girls prefer. And finally, because I used salted crackers and salted peanuts, I omitted the added salt recipe line entirely.
One final note: You want your cracker bits and your nuts ground finely. The first time I tried this, I thought it would be a fun thing for my three year old to help with, and gave her a hammer and let her beat the heck out of some crackers and nuts. Even after I also had a go with the hammer, they were nowhere near fine enough. I discovered too late my Gems would not form balls, and it was really difficult for me to roll them in the nuts. Save yourself the hassle and use a food processor or blender to pulse your crackers and then your nuts until the crackers are very fine and your nuts are very small pieces- but watch out that you don’t make some sort of nut butter by overgrinding. Use your processor or blender on the pulse setting only and then stopping right before your nuts begin to turn into a paste is ideal.
Alright, let’s get our vintage on!
Vintage Chocolate Gems Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups at least 60% cacao chocolate pieces or bits
- 1 sleeve Saltines salted
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup crushed nutmeats (your choice of nut)
Instructions
- Finely crush Saltines in a blender and set aside. Finely chop nuts and set aside.
- Melt chocolate in a double boiler, using a spatula to turn over until smooth. Turn off heat and remove double boiler from stove top, but leave the chocolate saucepan over the hot water.
- Add half of the crushed Saltines to the melted chocolate and stir to combine.
- Add extract, stir to combine, and then add the rest of the crackers.
- Use a tablespoon to scoop the mixture out and roll into balls using your hands. After making a ball, immediately roll it in the nuts and then place onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
- Once all your balls are formed and rolled in nuts, place the baking sheet in the fridge for about 15 minutes or until cool and solid.
- Remove from fridge and store in an airtight container.
Well, there you have it: Four ingredients, no baking, full satisfaction. I hope you enjoyed this vintage recipe- and keep your eyes peeled for more in this series in the future! You can also search for other vintage recipes by clicking on the “vintage series” tag at the top of this post. If you have any questions or thoughts about this recipe, make sure to let me know in the comment section below. Happy baking!
