A few months back I posted a recipe for Coconut Oatmeal Cookies and I talked about my fabulous cousin Chanelle and how her parents own and operate the Mackinac Island Gourmet Fudge Shop. They recently updated their website, and when they did, we ordered a pecan log and a box of turtles, and my mom got a special surprise inside of Peanut Butter Fudge, which is her favorite! I have to say these were the best we had ever had. It was all so fresh that it was like we were right there in the shop eating them.

This is the box they came in.

Pecan Log

Turtles

Peanut Butter Fudge

Then last week, just a week after we had received those first three things, we received a very special package for Valentines Day full of 5 little boxes of goody goodness. I nearly fell over looking at how awesome everything was. We normally always get the fudge every year for Christmas, which is amazing, so it was so nice to sample so many more varieties of the wonderful candy they make. I have to say that everything was good. I am a huge fan of bark in all flavors and this was definitely some of the best I had ever tasted.

Milk Chocolate Nutty Bark (the green ones are pistachios)

Aztec Bark (this stuff was good, it had an almost peppery/spicy kick at the end of the bite)

Dark Chocolate Berry Bark (uh-mazing)

Roasted Pecan Bark with Sea Salt (perfect)

One other thing that came was a box of Coconut Haystacks. Holy Moly they were delicious. And it was lucky that I actually got a picture before they all disappeared.

We are big fans of coconut around here anyway, so these were a big hit. I decided that I needed to try to recreate these for a special Valentines Day treat yesterday. I wasn’t exactly sure how to make them, so I just kind of threw things together from what I had in the kitchen. I love the Almond Joy candy bar as well, so I thought that adding in some chopped almonds would be a great addition. While these were not as good as the ones from the Mackinac Fudge Shop, they were pretty delicious!

I encourage you to support an American small business and check out this website and order something special for yourself or someone else. You will thank me when you receive your treats in the mail!

For the Gluten Free version of these, just use a GF chocolate.

Coconut Almond Chocolate Goodies

2 1/2 cups of sweetened shredded coconut

2 cups of chocolate baking chips (I used a mixture of semi-sweet and dark)

3/4 cup of almonds, chopped

I toasted my coconut this time, but I am thinking the next time I am not going to toast it and see if I like it better. It is good toasted and makes it really crunchy, but I think I want to try if I can get it softer like the Almond Joy.

If you want to toast it, spread out the 2 1/2 cups of coconut on a large baking sheet.

Turn on your oven to 400 degrees and put in the baking sheet. You will want to stand and watch it, because it only takes about 5-6 minutes to get it toasted and will burn very quickly. I had to turn my pan around once in the middle of baking so that both sides browned evenly.

Add your coconut and almonds to a large bowl.

Then melt your chocolate. If you have a double broiler you can use that. Or, if your like me and don’t have one, you can either use the microwave (which doesn’t always work well for me) or you can do this. Put your chocolate in a large glass measuring cup, then place it in a medium saucepan and then fill the saucepan up with water.

Place it on the stove over medium heat and stir constantly until melted.

Then pour the chocolate into the bowl with the coconut and almonds and mix until everything is completely coated with chocolate.

Line a baking sheet with parchment or wax paper. Then, using a small metal scooper like this one,

Scoop out the mixture and place it on the baking sheet. When I first tried this, the mixture was too warm to make it stay in a nice rounded form, so I stuck the bowl in the refrigerator for about an hour to let the chocolate harden up a little. This made it much easier to get a nice shape out of it.

Continue using the scooper until all of the mixture is used up. Then stick the baking sheet back in the refrigerator for about 20 more minutes until they firm up.

Since it is so warm here in sunny Florida right now, I decided to go ahead and put mine in a container and keep them in the fridge. You can place them into a nice serving dish and make it all fancy if you want to, but they will be gone before it really matters!