Monday, April 7, 2008

Flowers From My Kitchen

The child couldn't make up her mind.
One day it was butterflies. An hour later ladybugs were requested.
Finally, she settled on flowers.
We were talking about the decorative topping for her birthday cupcakes.

Several year ago I had made simple designs using melted chocolate piped onto parchment paper and I remembered being quite happy with the results. Great to embellish simple cakes.
But since she wanted colourful flowers (not just chocolate flowers), I turned to candy melts.
Though the process of making these flowers is just a little time consuming, the results are so wow-inducing that it is worth all the time.

Here is how I made them:
Step 1
Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper (not wax paper).
Melt about ½ cup of chocolate chips. I usually microwave them for about 20 seconds at a time till most of them are melted. At this point, stir the chips till they all melt and become smooth.
Spoon the melted chocolate in the corner of a zip top bag. Snip off a tiny piece of that corner. How much you snip off depends on how thick you want the outline.
Pipe the desired shape onto the parchment paper. Since I was making flowers, I piped an outline of the flowers.
Let the outline dry completely before moving onto Step 2.

Step 2
Follow directions on the package to melt the candy pieces. Spoon the melted chocolate in the corner of a zip top bag. Snip off a tiny piece of that corner.
Pipe the melted candy to fill in the petals and the center of the flowers. Make sure you completely fill into the outline.

Don't worry about flowers not being smooth. The side that is visible right now is the wrong side. The other side that is perfectly flat and smooth will be visible on the cupcakes.

After the flowers have cooled they slip right off the parchment paper.
They can be stored for several weeks in an airtight container.
As they taste pretty good on their own, you have to hide them from sneaky people.

The finished product:


Here is a flower topped cupcake. These were some super moist chocolate cupcakes. More about them in the next post.

 
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