Baking. Or, as the case is today, candy making.
Mmm. Sweet, sweet, candy making.
I do sometimes like to take a little break from making soaps, clean up my area really well (while soap is clean, I don't like to add SOAPY flavour to my goodies!), and hit the pots.
You can see in the background last weeks finished project: jam and fruit butter! They all turned out so delicious. It was my first attempt and they turned out lovely. I will tie ribbons around these and give them out to family members at Christmastime.
Today I am attempting to make some lovely chocolates of assorted flavours. I have some anise oil, I have powdered cinnamon, coconut, coffee, green tea, scharffen berger cocoa, ground lavender, and some cookie cutters and ice cube molds. I also have a few handy bags of assorted Ghirardelli chips. I prefer Guittard, but Ghirardelli is still quite good. I really wanted to try the new Dagoba chocolate I saw recently at one of the nearby Town & Country Markets, but the one I stopped in at on the way home didn't have any.
I also grabbed a box of almond paste to make a marzipan. Mmmm.
I melted down some sugar to make a soft caramel. I slowly got it to a nice, rich amber colour, then added some heavy cream and sea salt. The mixture started bubbling up so quickly, I reached for my spoon and stupidly forgot to pull on an oven mitt. Folks, steam is hot and can burn. The entire side of my right hand is now stinging from that little mistake. I now return you to your regular grade 2 lessons.
The whole mixture is quite soft, and now that it has cooled some, I have made a rather large and yummy ball of caramel. Check it out!
Closer! See how shiny! You can even see me pointing the camera in it:
The extra-sharp and super-nerdy among you might even recognise the rather abstract and distorted reflection of the "OMG Pwnies!" shirt I'm wearing.
I'm letting my chocolate shapes set up, then I think I will slice them and embed them into the tops of some filled candy.
I'll keep you posted...
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