Chocolate Drizzled Gourmet Popcorn

Name: Chocolate Drizzled Gourmet Popcorn
Cook time: 25 min
Total time: 25 min
Ingredients: 2 Tbsp. Avocado Oil (Or the neutral oil of your choice); 1/3 cup Popcorn Kernels; 1/4 cup Dark Chocolate (chopped); 1 tsp Sea Salt (Season to your liking)

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A perfect balance of sweet, salty, and endlessly munchable, this Chocolate Drizzled Gourmet Popcorn is the ultimate TV-watching snack. Made with just dark chocolate, popcorn kernels, and neutral oil, this 4-ingredient recipe is far more than the sum of its parts.

Chocolate Drizzled Gourmet Popcorn in a large bowl.

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⭐ Why You’ll Love This Recipe
🍴Ingredients
⚒️ Equipment
📖 Step by Step Instructions
⏲️ Substitutions & Variations
👩🏻‍🍳 Expert Tips
💭 Recipe FAQs
More Tasty, No-Oven Snack Recipes
Chocolate Drizzled Gourmet Popcorn
💬 Comments

⭐ Why You’ll Love This Recipe

When it comes to snacks, I’m always torn between salty and sweet. Luckily, my chocolate drizzled popcorn recipe has ample amounts of both! Perfectly fluffy pan-popped popcorn kernels are tossed with dark chocolate until well coated, resulting in a messy bowl of goodness that is too good to resist.

Granted, I love my “Better Than Movie Theater Popcorn” that is made with just brown butter and salt, but sometimes I need a little chocolate in the mix, ya know? I mean, “stressed” spelled backward is “desserts.” Coincidence? I think not.

This tasty recipe has all the hallmarks of a great salty-sweet baked dessert like my chocolate chip butterscotch toffee cookies, but there’s one key difference: you don’t have to turn the oven on to make popcorn!

While the temperatures are soaring to ever higher heights this summer, keeping my house cool is a top priority. That’s a big part of why I love this snackable chocolate popcorn. But this isn’t just a summer recipe; we eat it all year long.

If you have 25 minutes to spare and 4 basic pantry ingredients, you’re about to have a serious party in your mouth. If you don’t, bookmark this page for later — you’re definitely going to want to revisit this simple recipe in the future. This sweet and salty snack is perfect for your next movie night!

🍴Ingredients

As promised, you only need 4 simple ingredients to make chocolate-covered popcorn. Here’s what to grab:

Popcorn Kernels - Any color of popcorn kernels will work here; they all look the same in the end!
Neutral Oil - I prefer using refined coconut oil (not unrefined, which has too low of a smoke point). That said, feel free to use grapeseed, avocado, canola, vegetable, corn, or peanut oil instead.
Dark Chocolate - Since this is such a simple recipe, it’s important to use high-quality ingredients. If your grocery store doesn’t have nice chocolate chips (e.g. Guittard), check out the fancy chocolate bars in the candy section. I personally am a fan of deep dark chocolate, so I like to reach for anything over 70%. Feel free to swap in white, milk, semisweet, or even flavored chocolate if you prefer.
Salt (Optional) - If you, like me, love salty sweets, consider adding a pinch or two of salt to the finished product to really pep the flavors up.

labeled shot of chocolate popcorn recipe ingredients.

⚒️ Equipment

You don’t need much to make delicious chocolate drizzle popcorn. Here’s your equipment list:

Heavy-Bottomed Saucepan - Every kitchen needs a saucepan. A heavy bottom will prevent scorching and warping, which in turn will prevent you from stressing out and/or having to replace your equipment. PRO TIP: If you’re making browned butter popcorn the day you’re making your gourmet popcorn, don’t bother washing the pot between browning and popping.
Flexible Spatula - You’re going to want to toss the popcorn with the browned butter and chocolate until it’s well coated. A flexible silicone spatula makes the job a lot easier.
Napkins - Eventually, the chocolate will solidify on the popcorn as it cools. If you have that kind of willpower, good on you. For the rest of us, make sure there are plenty of napkins nearby.

📖 Step by Step Instructions

Gourmet popcorn shops have nothing on this chocolate popcorn. Here’s how to make it:

Step 1: Heat Oil. Heat a large, heavy-bottom pot over medium heat and add the coconut oil.

Popcorn kernels added to a hot skillet with oil.

Step 2: Test A Kernel. Once the oil is hot, add one test kernel to the pot and cover. As soon as the test kernel has popped, place the rest of the popcorn seeds into the oil and cover.

Popcorn popping in a skillet with the lid on top.

Step 3: Shake. Once the kernels begin popping, shake every 10 seconds or so until you hear the popping slow down then remove from heat.

Popcorn and chopped pieces of dark chocolate in a skilled.

Step 4: Add Chocolate. Add your dark chocolate bits on top of the popped popcorn and cover with the saucepan lid. The residual heat from the popcorn will help to easily melt the chocolate.

Chocolate popcorn in a mixing bowl with a spatula.

Step 5: Mix - Transfer the popcorn and chocolate into a large bowl and fold with a spatula to make sure every kernel is covered with salty, nutty, chocolatey goodness, then top with salt as needed. Portion into cups so there’s no fighting (trust me), then dig in! Keep your napkins at the ready, it's a beautiful mess of a snack!

⏲️ Substitutions & Variations

My gourmet chocolate-covered popcorn is pretty stellar on its own, but there is always room for customization. Here are a few of my favorite variations:

Add Crunch. Peanuts (or any toasted nuts), M&Ms, toffee bits, sweetened cereal, freeze-dried fruits, or pretzels are all excellent additions.
Use Different Chocolate. Make white chocolate popcorn, milk chocolate popcorn, zebra popcorn (by using dark and white chocolate) chili-chocolate popcorn, espresso-chocolate popcorn… you get the idea.
Make It Vegan. Use cultured dairy-free butter to make vegan browned butter and opt for a vegan-friendly chocolate brand.

👩🏻‍🍳 Expert Tips

Chop chocolate into tiny bits. The smaller the pieces, the faster they’ll melt.
Leftovers make great popcorn balls. Call me old-fashioned, but I hate wasting food. These popcorn balls are a great way to use up your leftovers!
Test kernels take the guesswork out of making popcorn on the stove. Add a single kernel to the pot to see when your oil is hot enough.
Place your covered chocolate popcorn in the fridge within a sealed plastic bag so that the chocolate solidifies and you have a cool, crunchy snack to enjoy as desired!

Chocolate popcorn with a bowl drizzled with dark chocolate and topped with sea salt.

💭 Recipe FAQs

How do you keep chocolate popcorn from getting soggy?

Popcorn can get soggy from exposure to humidity, being soaked in too much butter/toppings, or from being stale. Try to make it on the day you plan on eating it, stick to the measurements in the recipe card, and whatever you do, don’t put a lid on the pot while the popcorn cools or you’ll rain condensation down over it.

How far in advance can I make chocolate drizzled popcorn?

Technically, it can be made up to a day in advance. To store it, place the COMPLETELY cooled, room temperature chocolate popcorn in an airtight container, preferably with an extra layer of plastic wrap and a silica packet to keep it fresh. That said, it’s best the day you make it. If you have leftovers, consider turning them into popcorn balls to breathe new life into the kernels.

More Tasty, No-Oven Snack Recipes

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