All About Chocolate

Opps I did it again. No I have not lost my mind or been listening to Brittany Spears. What I did was overindulge with a chocolate basket. Can you even imagine? I started with the idea of creating a hot chocolate basket for the North Carolina State 4-H Volunteer Leaders Conference and what I ended up with was nine pounds of incredible chocolate bliss.

Seriously the plan was to get two mugs, a half dozen different types of hot chocolate and maybe some hot chocolate reciepes and leave it at that. Ok, so you know me better than that by now and I must admit when I got creative with it I just couldn't stop. In my last post I told you about my new favorite web site, Pinterest. One of the things I saw on there was jet puffed marshmellows dipped in carmel and chocolate that are used as hot chocolate stirrers. I was not sure how well carmerl would travel in basket so I adapted. The marshellows were dipped in melted choclate and rolled in choclate chips. I also made chocolate spoons. Two were plain chocolate, two were in white choclate with pepermint and then two were in chcolated with chocolate chips. Of course I did not stop there.

I went a little crazy buying at least six different types of chocolate to fill the basket with. There was carmel chocolate, dark choclate, chocolate covered almond kisses and the list goes on and on. Getting it to the auction was another story. My wonderful puppy offered up photos of some of the goodies on his facebook page. Bless his heart it got more responses than most of his posts, and by the time the basket got to Raliegh, 4-H Agents were plotting to appropriate different parts of the basket. However, once I convinced them that they know the person who got chocolate happy and would be more than happy to get choclate happy or spasdic for them. So with the basket safe for the auction all we could do was wait. Around 9:30 pm it was time for the chocolate basket to be auctioned. The crowd was on the light side at the auction. So when the bidding started off at $5 I wasn't shocked. Dollar by dollar the bidding started up and at $20 someone was going home with a basket, literally on a chocolate high.

Happy Holidays and Let In Snow Dipped in One

Each year I like to do a little something for the people I work with. Usually it is a cute ornament or cute Christmasy container of candy. This year I needed to do something different. So I decided to try an experiment. Marshmallow dipped snowmen. Basically I took three jumbo marshmallows and threaded them on a lollipop stick. dipped them in a white candy melt and decorated with black gel. Since the gel never hardens I will probably not do that again. I topped the snowman with a regular Oreo then half of a marshmallow. Voila, a yummy and cute snowman.

The snowman was placed in a small glass vase filled with Christmas candy (red and green m&M's, ribbon candy, hard candy) and was balanced with a traditional candy cane. The snowmen were very sweet and would make an excellent desert or hot chocolate stirrer. As does the candy cane, and while drinking hot chocolate there is a sweet treat to eat with it.

How Loud does a Peppermint Snowflake Bark?

I realize the title is just a bit corny but it has you reading this now doesn't it? Wilton put out a new candy kit this holiday season, a peppermint bark kit. The kit contains snowflake shaped cookie cutters, chocolate and peppermint candy melts as well as disposable decorator bags.

The cookie cutters are placed on a cookie sheet with a sheet of wax paper between the two. You start with the chocolate, melt it, and put a layer in each of the cookie cutters. I place the cookie sheet in the freezer for a few minutes to let the chocolate harden. Then it is time for the peppermint melts. After melting them you pipe a slightly thicker layer in the cookie cutter. Being impatient I place the cookie sheet back in the freezer to let this layer harden also. When I pull it out I carefully separate the bark and cookie cutter. Thus a really cute piece of peppermint bark is left with a snowflake shape.

We wrapped these individually and gave them out to family who came to visit after Thanksgiving. The cool, sweet treat went over well and travelled easily. It is a quick and fun gift that I plan to repeat for Christmas.

A Ducky Birthday

Often when people ask how I am I say ducky! They usually laugh and shake their head but every once in awhile I have someone who asks what I mean when I say that. What I actually mean is that I am calm on the surface and paddling like mad underneath. I tell you this to say I have a special connection to the duck. So when it came time to make a birthday cake for our new interim director what could I do but a duck? I say this sarcastically as I try not to push my ideas on others.

However after only knowing him for a few months coming up with a great cake was tough so I called the one person who I knew who would know, his secretary. She was wonderful at pitching ideas and said he enjoys duck hunting. I knew that I had a 3-D rubber duck cake pan that I had once used to make a chicken cake, so how hard could it be to convert it to a normal duck? I baked a butter cake and ended up with a great 3-D duck cake. A little carving of the head and neck (and a photo of a mallard up on my lap top) a mallard duck was created. To help decorate several candy ducks were made to decorate around the cake. He might not be perfect but he did let us sing Happy Birthday before he lost his head, literally. It did not take long to devour this cake. The birthday man (boy seems a little inappropriate especially for your supervisor) seemed pleased with his cake too.