Sometimes You Feel Like A Nut

and sometimes you don't! A friend and I made Mounds a couple of weeks ago but they didn't turn out great. I brought mine home and Jim really liked them but the kids said, "Meh.". Well, I decided I would try to make them better. I read up on about 15 blogs, 30 recipes and picked out what I thought would work better and came up with these. They are a little less sweet and stick together really well.


Homemade Mounds or Almond Joys

1 package sweetened coconut flakes
3/4 of a bag of powdered sugar
3/4 cup mashed potatoes (make the instant as directed)
2 Tablespoons melted butter

1 package semi-sweet chocolate chips
3 Tablespoons shortening (NOT oil!)

For Almond Joys: toast about 45 whole raw almonds in the oven at 400' for 10 minutes
1 package milk chocolate chips
3 Tablespoons shortening


Fill a double boiler as directed and place powdered sugar and butter over boiling water. Stir constantly until a thick liquid. Stir in mashed potatoes until smooth. Add the coconut flakes and stir for about 3 minutes. Take off stove and place in freezer for 30 minutes stirring half way through.

Spread out 1/4 of the coconut mixture on a wax paper sheet. Put the rest in the refriderator. Flatten mixture to about 1/2" high and cut with a very sharp knife so the pieces are about 3/4" wide by 1" long. I wanted something that was 2 bites. (If you are making Almond Joys press toasted nuts into the top now.) Place these on a baking sheet on wax paper. Repeat until done with coconut mixture. Place molded pieces back in the freezer for 30 minutes.

About 5 minutes before you take the molded pieces out of the freezer boil water in the double boiler and melt appropriate type of chocolate and shortening for dipping.

Working quickly dip each molded piece in the chocolate. (Note: I used two forks and would dip, tap off excess, drag back of fork over edge and replace on the wax paper.) Once completely done it will take about an hour for the chocolate to be set. These will last nicely for about 4 days and, if you are desperate, for about a week.

The recipes that call for sweetened condensed milk are too sweet and mushy. I like this one because they don't fall apart due to the starch in the potatoes and the potatoes cut the sweetness just enough to make me want to eat more than one at a time.