Thursday, April 09, 2009

Success

A few weeks ago I made "Cupcake Bites".

The Bites were my very first foray into candy making. I guess not candy, but chocolate. I was very worried that it would be hard, the packages are covered with warnings about over heating, about how to keep it warm so you can work with it about how the slightest bit of moisture will ruin the candy, and it was just...scary.. But, at the same time, I really, REALLY wanted to try to make them.

And so I did.

And you know what? It was time consuming, but it was not that hard. I melted the candy in my microwave on "defrost" becuase I do now own a double boiler. In fact, I am uncertain what a double boiler is, exactly.

The bites were cute, and fin, but I was not a fan of the cake inside. According tot he recipe, I had to bake a cake, then crumble it, then mix in a tub of store bought icing to make the balls. For the icing, I used a store brand that I knew already was not a very good tasting one, and that might have caused the problems. I will be making them again, for Blake to bring to his class for his birthday, but I will be using the "good" icing (and a white cake mix, the chocolate cake covered in the chocolate was just too much chocolate!)

Because of my cake Bite success, I felt confidant going to Michael's and picking up more meltable candy and some molds to play around with. I decided to try my hand at some Easter themed chocolate suckers. I was pretty taken with the Horse mold they had (it would be so fun, and challenging, to try to "paint" the candy for all theequestrian apparel). Another mold I fell in love with was a race car mold. The picture on the package showed sweet fire and lightning designs painted onto the cars!

In the end though, we just picked up the Easter mold and left the decision of what to make for next time. Besides, just becuase the Cake Bites were a success, does not mean I will succeed with the Suckers.

Except... I was!





I had So much fun making these, and after the first set, I invited the boys to help me make some too. Since we only bought one mold, I was only able to make nine suckers at a time, and since after each color is "painted" on, the mold has to be refrigerated to set the chocolate, it was a very time consuming activity, but OMG was it ever fun.



1 comment:

phinz said...

Those are REALLY cool! You got this candy thing DOWN, Sparky!

A double boiler is just one pan set atop another pan of boiling (or simmering) water. You can improvise one by placing a metal or glass bowl on top of an uncovered (no lid) sauce pan--the bowl should NOT touch the surface of the water; the heat/steam from the water gently cooks whatever is in the bowl.