Halloween Treats

Its that time of year again! My favourite day of the year when you get to dress up as whatever you want and have the pants scared off of you! Being away from home I had to think of some Halloween treats to make that don't require a lot of equipment because I have yet to purchase even a hand mixture so I'm really out of luck when it comes to a majority of recipes. My all-time favourite chocolate bar is Crunchie, which is essentially sponge toffee covered in chocolate. Since they are so hard to find here in the US I decided to make some sponge toffee myself because I know how easy it is to make.

Sponge Toffee

1 cup of sugar
1 cup of corn syrup
1 tablespoon of vanilla extract
1 tablespoon of baking soda

1. Before you do anything I caution you to prepare your pan VERY well to hold this concoction in. If you don't grease the hell out of the pan or lay some parchment down you will be standing over a sink for hours on end. So line a 9x9 baking pan with oodles of parchment and heck spray it with some cooking spray as well.
2. Combine the sugar, corn syrup, and vanilla extract together in a saucepan (NOTE: make sure the saucepan in double the size of the ingredients when mixed together because once you add the baking soda the mix will puff up like crazy). Cook the mixture on medium heat until it reaches 300 degrees F or hard crack stage. Remove from the heat and quickly stir in the baking soda with a wooden spoon. Only stir enough to dissolve the baking soda, you don't want to deflate all the bubbles.
3. Quickly pour the mixture into your prepared pan and let set for 30 minutes before breaking it into pieces. At this point you can eat them as is or dip them in chocolate; either way its delicious.

A new favourite chocolate bar of mine since arriving in the US is Almond Joy. I love anything coconut and whoever has had an almond joy knows that there is a lot of coconut involved.

Almond Joy Bars

8 oz of sweetened condensed milk
12 oz of shredded coconut
1 1/2 cups of powdered sugar
1 tablespoon of vanilla extract
30 almonds (approximately)
16 oz of chocolate couverture

Note: If you don't know what couverture is or you can't get your hands on some you can melt down 16oz of semi-sweet chocolate chips with about half a cup of butter.

1. Prepare a 9x9 baking pan by covering it in saran wrap and spraying with a bit of cooking spray.
2. In a bowl, mix together the condensed milk and the powdered sugar until creamy. Add the vanilla extract. Stir in the coconut a little at a time making sure a get a stiff mixture that is still workable. Spread the mixture in your pan, pressing down firmly. Freeze for 15 minutes.
3. In the meantime temper your chocolate couverture. Pull your coconut base out of the fridge and cut it into bars about 1 inch x 2 inch rectangles. Glue on two almonds to each bar with a little bit of chocolate. Put the bars back into the freezer for another ten minutes.
4. Making sure your chocolate is still tempered, take the bars out of the freezer and dip them in chocolate. Place them on a silpat to harden.

Mind my feet :P

TA-DA!

Happy Halloween! :D

MIB: Missing in Baking...

So I just realized that I haven't posted anything in a very long time in comparison to how I posted before so I feel like you guys deserve an explanation. I've moved away from home to do some more schooling. I'm currently in Austin, Texas studying. I know what you are thinking, but she already went to school?!! Yes I know but I wanted to look at a different side of the industry so I can cover all my bases. This degree will come in handy one day when I decided to open up a business of my own. Also being here in the music capitol of the world there is surprisingly alot of food business going on here. There is currently a movement of food trucks. You find little parks of them here and there where they have set up permanently for business. There is even one that makes just cupcakes, but I have yet to try one. The only thing that Austin is missing is a churro food truck which I would open personally if I could and name it the "Churro Burro".

As for more posts I'll see how much I can do. I have no mixer, and learned that last week you cannot make a meringue without a mixer haha, that was a mess. I have limited resources but I'm persistent and I like to bake, who doesn't love sugar, so I'm hoping to blog about something new soon.