Although I’d never be so callous to rank food—partially due to indecision, and mostly due to the fact that talking about food in such absolutes is folly and not the behaviour of a real Food Lover—but—I had previously been so vaingloriously certain of my stupid convictions about peppermint and now I’d casually call it a top three flavour. Again, if I was to rank the unrankable, that is, food. And I’m only being rewarded for my incorrect opinions, because, well, now I’m just going to keep making peppermint-related recipes. Like this entirely no-bake Chocolate Peppermint Slice.

I’m unsure on the true origins of this slice, usually confined to small-town bakeries—dense biscuit base, a smooth peppermint icing filling, and an equally smooth chocolate top, cut into squat slabs—though my guess is a 20th century provenance, due to the relative decadence of the chocolate, compared to say, a similarly layered but more austerely jammy Louise Cake. Needless to say, though this recipe is mine, the framework pre-dates me and arrives with that self-assured comforting presence of the long-held culinary concept. I’ve made the mildly debauched decision to add a small quantity of white chocolate to the filling for added fulsome, mouth-rushing buttery lusciousness; and stand by my decision, though it’s kind of flagrant and foolhardy. The cost of living crisis sucks, but including slightly more chocolate isn’t going to make it suck any less—on the other hand, I have tested this recipe without butter and found it held its own honorably, if you want to make savings elsewhere in the ingredients list.

Like a scientific cross-section of the earth’s mantle, each slice presents a tripartite journey of immense textural joy. The biscuit base, made earthen with cocoa, its condensed milk moistened crumbs clinging to each other (plus a little butter or coconut oil to fortify your foundation). The filling, a tooth-blasting combination of melted white chocolate, butter, and icing sugar, made polar-arctic with peppermint essence, the iciness of which makes the sweetness entirely process-able in a way that other flavour enhancements wouldn’t.

It’s sweet, sure, but endlessly balanced by the wind chill factor. To make sure it’s not too balanced, you then cover the lot in milk chocolate—not dark, mind you, unless it’s your especial preference—I maintain that the peppermint is already providing the sensible grounding that dark chocolate’s bitterness would provide, and doesn’t need any further de-embellishment. Milk chocolate, though adding further sweetness and mildness, works perfectly and lets the peppermint shine. I also recommend a pinch of salt here and there—it makes the peppermint sing.

Despite the triple-threat of layers, this is wonderfully easy to make—especially if you have a food processor to pulverise the biscuits, but it’s not impossible if you don’t—and, I need to grab you by the shoulders and stare into your eyes when I say this, it tastes exceptional. Again, I must point to that texture which is like a fairground ride for the teeth to slide through, the breathtaking dance of almost-too-sweet, rich, frostily minty and a hint of salt, and the simple elegant friendship of chocolate and peppermint, the iciness of the latter somehow making the former more sleek and velvety on the tongue. No wonder this slice is a bakery classic—and now, a classic in my previously-churlish heart forevermore—it’s astonishingly delicious.

For more adventures in accepting peppermint into my life, I recommend this recipe for mint choc chip ice cream—no-churn, of course—and this peppermint espresso martini.

And if I may, a reminder that you can sign up here to hear irregular and unobtrusive updates and details about my forthcoming 2025 debut novel, Hoods Landing. Find out more, which you probably already know, at my official author website. You can also, thrillingly, pre-order Hoods Landing worldwide and locally for delivery or pickup—tell your friends! Tell your enemies! Tell the indifferent, who could be swayed in either direction!

Chocolate peppermint slice

A philharmonic symphony of texture that truly showcases peppermint at its icy best, this familiar bakery slice is incredibly easy to make at home and could even make a convert of the peppermint-suspicious. This concept is obviously not in the slightest bit original to me, or indeed, any of us, but the recipe that follows is my own. Before going shopping for ingredients, I recommend checking out the Boycott Aotearoa zines so you know which brands to avoid.

Base:

• 1 x 250g pack plain biscuits—I used Super Wines
• 75g butter (or 50g refined coconut oil)
• 125ml (1/2 cup) sweetened condensed milk
• 3 tablespoons cocoa

Filling:

• 50g butter (or 30g refined coconut oil)
• 80g white chocolate
• 250g icing sugar
• 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon peppermint essence
• 2-3 tablespoons cold water
• If not using salted butter, add 1/4 teaspoon salt

Topping:

• 200g milk chocolate
• 25g butter (or two tablespoons refined coconut oil)
• A pinch—about quarter of a teaspoon—of salt

1: Break up the entire packet of biscuits roughly with your hands as you drop them into a food processor, and process a few times on high to break the biscuits down into rough crumbs.

2: In a saucepan, gently melt the 75g butter until just liquidised, and pour this into the food processor along with the 125ml sweetened condensed milk and the three tablespoons of cocoa. Process again until thoroughly combined and clumping together in a dense, cocoa-y mass.

3: Fetch a 20cm square cake tin and press a sheet of baking paper into it, then spatula in the processed cocoa-biscuit-crumbs mixture and press out with the back of a spoon that you’ve run under the cold tap, or use your bare, clean hands to get it into an evenly flat layer that covers the entire base of the tin. Refrigerate while you make the filling.

4: Melt the 50g butter and 80g white chocolate together slowly—now, you can use the same saucepan as before over low, direct heat if you’re feeling rakish, or you can place a heatproof metal bowl over a pan of simmering water and melt them together in that, or—assuming you have a microwave—you could microwave them together in short bursts in a heatproof bowl. If you take the direct-heat-saucepan approach, spatula the melted butter and chocolate into a separate bowl as soon as it’s liquified before mixing in anything else.

5: Okay, so—however you got there with your melted butter and white chocolate, slowly stir in the 250g icing sugar—I should sift this, but rarely do, as the lumps seem to work their way out with enough stirring—and the peppermint essence, beginning with 1/4 teaspoon, and tasting before adding more. This can handle quite a bit of peppermint burn with all that sugar, but the strength of flavour will vary from brand to brand. Stir in a couple of tablespoons of cold water—again, start with two tablespoons and only add another splash if, after stirring, the mixture is still un-pourably thick. You should have a glossy, pale and thick but slow-moving mixture, if it’s too stiff, add more water. Slowly.

6: Pour this gleaming, peppermint-scented mixture over the refrigerated biscuit base, tilting the pan left and right to create an even layer rather than spreading it out with a knife or spatula. Return to the fridge for now.

7: Finally, melt the 200g milk chocolate—and I won’t go into your options again, you already know—along with the 25g butter. Pour this over the peppermint filling, which should have cooled and firmed up in its brief time in the fridge, and once again tilt the pan left and right to gently coax the chocolate to cover everything evenly. Sprinkle over the pinch of salt and refrigerate one last time.

Lift the slice from the pan by lifting the sides of the baking paper; allow to sit for a just a minute or two before slicing four by four; you will probably still end up with a few cracked chocolate tops here and there, which will not matter a whit once you bite into it. That being said, I’m still working on my non-cracked chocolate slicing technique and will report back when and how I improve…

Makes sixteen good-sized squares.

Notes:

• The coconut oil version was also delicious—although I preferred the taste and texture of the base with butter, it still tasted excellent both ways; however I find a little less coconut oil goes an equally long way. Make sure you get the refined stuff so the coconut flavour doesn’t overpower, unless that’s what you’re after.
• You could use a drop or two of food-grade pure peppermint oil but honestly, the cheapest peppermint essence works perfectly here.
• The tin needs to be 20cm—any larger and the layers are thrown off.
• It’s more expensive but nonetheless I use Whittakers chocolate because it’s made in New Zealand, more delicious and less sus than boycott-listed Cadbury, you can, importantly, taste every single dollar and—honestly—there’s just not other viable options out there! It’s either the dreadful slightly cheaper chocolate or the excellent very expensive chocolate, nothing in between. To that end; you can use dark chocolate in the topping if you want, and I can see why you might, but it’s the mellower, rounder milk chocolate taste that works best for me here. Dark chocolate is a little too brusque for these purposes.

music lately:

Sophie’s World by Baby Formula. It pays to get lost: while distractedly looking up the novel Sophie’s World on Wikipedia, I found out that a Chinese shoegaze band had referenced it in this song; and in the process, learned of this immensely stunning, swirlingly fuzzy and sparkly full album, and couldn’t be happier or more vehement in my recommendation that you listen to it, starting with this aforementioned light-headed, dizzying song (which only has 244 views on youtube, I need this number to go up for the sake of ALL of our mental health.)

A Rusty Old Halo, by Mahalia Jackson. Although S2 of The L Word is…hectic, there’s a moment where Pam Grier and Jennifer Beals sing this song as a peaceful lullaby to Ossie Davis in what would be his final screen appearance and it is momentously lovely.

Goddess on a Hiway by Mercury Rev, a song so floppily melancholic that it makes me immediately feel as though a raincloud has leapfrogged through my window and situated itself on top of my head; obviously a musical feeling that is required now and then.

PS: Feeling hopeless is a luxury that serves no one but those perpetrating the hopelessness. You can donate to ReliefAid’s Gaza Appeal, who are connected with teams on the ground in Gaza; you can donate to Convoys of Good, another registered NZ charity distributing aid. If you’re in Pōneke, check out this kid-led and kid-friendly fundraising event on 24 August. You can also donate to mutual aid accounts such as the one discussed in this harrowing but necessary story. Don’t be afraid of the non-matching account name when you transfer! As I’ve already mentioned, you can also demonstrate your control and power through the absence of your dollars. Boycott Zine Aotearoa has helpfully put together two comprehensive free zines so you can quickly see who to studiously avoid when buying food, drinks, household items and beauty products.