Probably the MOST difficult thing I make for the holiday boxes every year are chocolates. Some years they come out great. Others they are a nightmare. A lot of this has to do with the craps game which is Houston humidity. Jam, jellies, chocolate and candies are WAY more difficult to get right in high humidity. When the humidity is high things don’t turn out they way I want.This year in addition to making my usual molded chocolates, I decided I would make turtles, chocolate almond bark and peppermint chocolate bark.
The bark is actually super easy to make if you have a silpat silcone mat. You melt the chocolate, mix in the bark aspect whether nuts or candy, then spread the mixture onto the silcone mat and chill. Simple! Except if things are humid and the chocolate doesn’t temper right. The bark still tastes fine but it doesn’t have the professional looking sheen it should.
The molded chocolates are also fairly easy. My tip is to pipe the chocolate into the molds. It makes things neater and can be faster process wise. The only trick is one has to pipe FAST before the chocolate cools to much. Another tip is to not worry to much about getting it in evenly in the mold. This can be easily fixed by banging the mold to distribute the chocolate while it is still hot.
Turtles are a COMPLETELY different ball game. Getting the caramel properly melted was a NIGHTMARE. I burned myself on the hot caramel – Twice. Also if you want the chocolate to coat both sides of the turtle you have to coat and flip. A silicone mat is a MUST so that the candies don’t stick and make a giant mess on something like parchment. While the turtles were neat to make, I’m not sure I’ll do them again because of the MASSIVE effort required.