For more Wordless Wednesday, visit here!
candy
Beginner’s candy-making with Meg
Armed with a print-out from Allrecipes.com and a little bit of chutzpah, I set about making a tasty fall treat for my Halloween pot luck at the office tomorrow: candy corn bark. Had I heard of this sort of snack? No — but it’s delicious!
I ran into a few problems right off the bat while gathering my ingredients at Target last night: They did not carry the specific type of chocolate cookies the recipe calls for, and they were sold out of white chocolate baking chips. Not a great start! But I improvised: they did have graham crackers (I figure chocolate, grahams . . . you know where I’m headed with this!) and plenty of milk chocolate baking chips. I know that “improvising” isn’t usually a good idea for an inexperienced chef, but I was exhausted after a very long day . . . and Mom and I were not about to head over to a grocery store.
Making our own Halloween magic
We all know that as we grow up and enter the “adult” world, the magic of the holidays begins to fizzle out a bit, lost in the shuffle of e-mails, requests for time off, paperwork and crazed schedules . . . at least until we have our own children. Considering I’m not quite at that stage of life yet, I’m forced to enthuse as much of my own holiday joy into my usual, everyday life as I can!
This Friday, Halloween, I’ll put these skills to the test. Since I’ll be at work until early evening, I’ll be dressing up with my co-workers — probably as a witch — and fueling up on as much sugar as possible. We’re having a Halloween party, too — and this is where my next food dilemma comes in.
As I frequently blog, I’m trying (sometimes vainly) to learn how to cook. So rather than going for all of my old pot luck standby foods — brownies, pasta salad — I’m going to branch out and try something . . . different. Something fall-ish. Something with a Halloween theme!
I know, I’m talking crazy. But I found this recipe on AllRecipes.com, and I’m going to try it:
Candy Corn Bark
Ingredients:
• 16 Halloween-colored chocolate sandwich cookies, chopped
• 1 1/2 cups broken small pretzels
• 1/3 cup raisins
• 1 1/2 pounds white chocolate, broken into squares
• 2 cups candy corn
• orange and brown sprinkles
Directions
1. Spread the cookies, pretzels and raisins evenly onto a lightly greased small baking sheet. Melt chocolate in a bowl set over a pan of simmering water, or in the microwave, stirring frequently until melted. Remove from the heat while there are still a few chunks, and stir until smooth. White chocolate burns easily.
2. Drizzle chocolate with a spoon over the goodies in the pan, spreading the top flat to coat evenly. Top with candy corn and sprinkles. Let cool until firm. Break into pieces and store in an airtight container.
~*~*~
Several folks on the website suggested using peanuts instead of cookies, so I think I’m going to do that — and I plan on tripling this recipe to make enough for all my snacking co-workers! And so I can have an extra batch for my snacking family — especially me. I’m off to get all my ingredients after work tonight.
If you’re looking for other goodies to make for Friday, check out the rest of their Halloween recipes and concoctions. Making my own hot spiced cider sounds pretty awesome, too . . . I love the fall!
write meg! 