When I fold the laundry (which, truth be told, is not as often as it should be, a clean heap can usually be found on the chair in our bedroom, dubbed by the family as the "chair of shame"), I usually watch a few minutes of tv and on Sunday I was watching the Food Network, Barefoot Contessa in London. Ina Garten's recipes are very dependable for our family, I've never really made anything of hers that didn't turn out delicious without alot of crazy prep. On this show, she made white chocolate lollipops, and they looked so easy, I knew the kids and I would have fun adding them to our holdiay "baking" list.
I'm not a big fan of white chocolate, so I chose semi-sweet chocolate chips, and we picked to add to them: roasted cashews, dried cherries, candied ginger, toffee bits, miniature peppermint candy canes (these available at Home Cake if you are local, read a great write up about this store on Seattle Bon Vivant.).
We melted the chocolate in the microwave, then spooned the chocolate onto parchment in rounded globs. We inserted the lollipop stick into the center and gave it a little twist to cover it, then proceeded to add something to each on (or not, since we left some plain for Ian, the purist).
We made about 40 out of 3 bags of chocolate chips (okay, we did eat some of the chocolate). They set up at room temperature in about an hour, then we bagged them in cellophane and tied them with yarn.
Super easy!
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P.S.- Check it, I have a new header : D
