Cooking on the bright side of life

I love making chocolate candy this time of year. They make great Christmas gifts and you can make them exactly how you like them.

There are just 3 rules you should follow to ensure your chocolate candy turns out perfectly:

• Buy good quality chocolate! You can’t buy cheap chocolate and hope that melting it and adding filling will magically make it better.
• Be patient. Melt the chocolate in a water bath that has 40°C/104°F. For me that’s the lowest heat (1 out of 9) on my stove. Yes, that will take 10-15 Minutes, depending on the amount of chocolate your are melting. But this is how you ensure your chocolate will stay shiny and creamy after melting.
• Avoid drops of water in your chocolate. That will make it brittle. So please be careful with the water bath.

If you don’t have candy moulds and you don’t want to buy them, you can also make small chocolate bars, using aluminum foil with edges folded up as makeshift moulds. But actual moulds will of course look nicer if you plan to give them as gifts.

Or you can also make beautiful homemade chocolate bars by using toppings like freeze dried berries, edible dry flowers, nuts, pink pepper, etc.

Chocolate Candy (Pralines)

How to make your own chocolate candy. These also make great gifts!

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Servings: 15 Pralines

Ingredients Equipment Method

Ingredients

  

• 50 g Dark chocolate
• 125 g Milk chocolate
• 50 g White chocolate If you don't like white chocolate, use additional 50g milk chocolate
• 200 g Nougat
• 30 g Pecans roasted
• 1 tsp Cinnamon
• up to 1 tsp Coconut oil
• 1 pinch Salt

Equipment

• Silicone candy moulds
• Cooking thermometer Not required but helpful
• water bath or other small pot/metal bowl

Method

 

1. First, decide what should be the top layer of your chocolates. I usually do half white and half milk chocolate. Then add hot water to a pot for your water bath and put on the stove on low heat (for me 1 out of 9). Add the white chocolate (or milk chocholate of you are skipping the white) to your waterbath pot, put the pot on top of the pot with water and let the chocolate melt. Stir occasionally.
2. In the meantime, get the chocolte moulds ready. In case you have rinsed them, make sure they are 100% dry!
3. Once the chocolate has melted, take the waterbath pot, wipe the bottom to avoid water drippings, and carefully fill the bottom of the moulds to approximately ¼. Use a small spoon or something similar to avoid dripping when you are moving from one mould to the next. When you are finished, gently bump the moulds onto the counter a few times. This helps flatten the chocolate and get rid of air bubbles. You will see the bubbles come up while you are doing this. Afterwards, put the moulds in the fridge (or outside in the winter time).
4. If you have Monk-like tendencies like me or are striving for perfectly looking gifts, use a toothpick to clean the insides of the moulds in case you got anything on the edges.
5. Next, repeat the same process with 50g of the milk chocolate.
6. Afterwards, add the nougat to the waterbath. While it's melting, roast the pecans in a small pot and then finely chop them.
   
7. When the nougat has melted, add the chopped pecans and cinnamon. For the cinnamon, add up to 1 tsp, depending on your taste.
   
8. Get the moulds out of the fridge, make sure that the chocolate has sufficiently cooled, and then add the nougat layer to the moulds. Make sure to leave some space for the final chocolate layer. Remember to bump onto the counter to evenly distribute the nougat. Put back in the fridge.
   
9. Add the dark chocolate and the remaining milk chocolate to the waterbath pot. Add about ⅛-¼ tsp of coconout oil to the chocolate. This step can be skipped, but I have found that without it, the bottom layer has a different (harder) bite to it compared to the other layers.
10. Once the dark chocolate has melted, get the moulds out of the fridge, make sure the nougat has cooled, and add the final chocolate layer. To avoid frayed edges, remove excess chocolate with a toothpick or a spatula. Return to the fridge for at least 2-3 hours.
11. Finally, get the moulds out of the fridge and turn them inside out. I usually use a small spoon to push, to avoid melting the chocolate with my fingers.