A S’more-gasbord of S’mores!

When you think,”summer treat,” what’s the first thing that comes to mind?  S’mores!  (Go with it, the post is about s’mores, not about ice cream.)  Unfortunately, when everyone else is standing around the bonfire (or grill) toasting their marshmallows and attempting to break their graham crackers on the dotted line, I’m standing off to the side wishing for a gluten-free, egg-free, dairy-free s’more.  Sick of missing it out on all the gooey, chocolatey fun, I set out to make an intolerance-free treat.

I started with a “graham” cracker that is gluten-free, dairy-free, egg-free, and nut-free by Kinnikinnick Foods.  By the way, I put “graham” in quotes because there is no actual graham flour in this product; graham flour is a coarse wheat flour and wheat has gluten in it.

GF/DF/EF/NF “Graham” Cracker!

Then it was on to the search for chocolate.  This wasn’t too difficult because chocolate is my favorite treat, so I had it on hand.  I love Ghiradelli Semi-Sweet chocolate in chips, but they are hard to balance on the cracker.  I also find that I have more control over how much I eat if I buy chocolate in bars.  Baker’s Semi-Sweet chocate bar breaks into rectangles and two is a nice indulgence for me (and it’s only 2 points for you Weight Watcher point counters).  Best of all, it’s dairy-free, which is hard to find.   You know when you eat chocolate, it coats your mouth?  I miss that (sigh.)  Ghiradelli has that smooth mouth feel, and Baker’s is a close second.

Baker’s Semi-Sweet is dairy free!

Now a word about the marshmallows.  I can eat regular marshmallows as they are devoid of all my trigger ingredients.  That said, the regular ones are filled with additives and aren’t a great choice.  But this being a treat, meaning a very once-in-a-while food, I made mine with those.  If you are vegan or vegetarian, you will have to pick a different marshmallow: Marshmallows contain gelatin, which is the protein that is extracted when the skin, cartilage, bones and hooves of animals are boiled down.  I hope you knew this and I am not grossing you out.  If you are a vegan, vegetarian, or newly grossed out, you can use a vegan marshmallow.  There are two brands that you can buy online and I found an excellent review of both, so feel free to use one of those.  Otherwise, grab your store-bought, run-of-the-mill, gelatin-containing marshmallows and lets get s’moring! (If it’s not a word, it is now!)

First, I attempted to break the “graham” cracker on the line.  I had prepared to go through a few crackers before getting an even break, but it broke perfectly on the first try – Bravo Kinnikinnick!  And not only did it break perfectly on the first try, it was the perfect size for the chocolate square!

Since I didn’t have a bonfire going, and my grill was still warm from dinner, I took my ingredients outside.  I thought it might be a good idea to soften up the chocolate a little.  I’m not a fan of a hot toasted marshmallow being paired with a cold, hard piece of chocolate.  I put the chocolate with the cracker on the part of the grill that was not on so that the radiant heat would soften the chocolate, while not toasting the cracker.  It worked!

Marshmallow toasting, chocolate warming.

Once the marshmallow was about to fall off the skewer, it was time to assemble the s’more.  I took the cracker with the chocolate off the grill and used the top cracker to press the marshmallow onto the chocolate while pulling out the skewer.  I let it sit for a minute while the flavors melded (and pictures were taken).  Then it was time to dig in…

Holy cow and yum! S’mores for me!

Not only was this the best s’more I had tasted in a long time (in part because I hadn’t tasted a s’more in a long time), I was able to enjoy this delicious treat because it wouldn’t make me sick.

Even if you are not intolerant or allergic to gluten, dairy, or egg, you may want to consider keeping these items on hand for your next barbeque,bonfire, or camp out.  You never know, I might drop by for dessert!

xo

B

EDIT:  Oopsy!  The Ghiradelli chocolate bar that I originally mentioned in this post has dairy in it!  The Ghiradelli semi sweet chocolate chips that I normally buy does not.  I updated the post to reflect that error.  Sorry for the mix up!