marshmallow chocolate stirrers...

hi all!

well pezza finally got to experience the childhood glory that is chuck e cheese.  frankly i have been putting it off as long as possible.  having already raised 2 kids i have spent more than my fair share of time in the torment & insanity that is CEC.  in fact one of the things i told kevin when we decided to have pezza was that HE would be handling ALL CEC parties.  yea guess who had to work last night....to be fair the party was early, 4-6.  so off we went to have some fun.  and i have to say it was a remarkebly good experience - the FIRST in CEC.  for one thing it seemed much bigger and less crowded than the ones we visited in the past.  in addition it was nearly empty - that is the true blessing!  so pezza got to try out some fun games and stuff and everything was only 1 token.  i remember in the arcades when the boys were younger games were costing 2-3 even 4 quarters each.  she even played skee ball - pezza flingin hard balls willy nilly - saw my life flash before my eyes several times.  the one big disappointment was how many of the games were broken - especially the ones with no sign on them so you didn't find out until after it took your token - really annoying.  overall a fun time though.  we brought one of her friends home with us and listening to the conversation in the back seat was hysterical.  he is obssessed with dinosaurs and was talking about a show called kung fu dino posse.  really????  every time he said the name in his very serious little 5 year old voice i was cracking up!

what other fun thing did i do yesterday - dipped marshmellows.  for those who missed it on facebook:

yea.  there was a bit of a learning curve with this.  don't be fooled.  it was not as simple as melt chocolate, poke marshmallow, dip, add sprinkles.  oh no.....for one thing i melted my candy melts TOO long and guess what happens - they go PAST the melted stage and back to the hard stage - very odd.  BUT i remembered a tip about doing this for cake pops on my buddy cat's blog - add some crisco too thin out the coating for a smoother look.  *frantic search for crisco i KNOW i have more of SOMEwhere*  ok.  got it all nice and melted and thin, dipped my candy cane tip in , pushed it into the melted candy, swirled it around and stuff and realized - IT WAS TOO HOT - my marshmallow was MELTING!  dip it in sprinkles, throw it all dripping and gooey onto the parchment lined cookie sheet.  yea that will be a hit in the treat bag - NOT.  so i added more crisco and let it cool down a bit before continuing.  dip in chocolate, dip in sprinkles, set down and watch all the excess pool off onto the parchment and cover the sprinkles.  dip, TAP OFF EXCESS, dip in sprinkles, set down, fall over.  pick up. fall over.  pick up. fall over and knock next one over too, get candy melt all over candycane.  i am having SO much fun. gonna be real proud bringing these into preschool.....but i kept going!  i wish i had found peppermint sticks but all i had was candy canes so breaking off the curvy part was an adventure all it's own.  so my sticks are all different sizes.  i was concerned at first but i quickly realized it was the least of my problems.  i did finally get most of the kinks worked out and the 3rd & 4th rounds turned out much better:

so here are my pointers in one easy to find place:

1. when melting the candy melts add crisco - add and stir it in until the coating is pretty thin and runny - not water but just so you can dip and get a nice smooth even thin coating.
2. melt them in a container deep enough so you can just dip them straight in and cover them completely - i used a one cup measuring cup and melted about 3/4 cups of candy melts.
3. set it aside to cool a tiny bit whie you get your candy canes, marshmallows and sprinkles ready - i only did 9 of each so it worked out well.  don't set it aside for so long it hardens :)
4. set the marshmallows on a plate, dip the tip of your candy cane in the melted chocolate and then push it straight into the marshmallow WHILE it is sitting on the plate. - that is the only way i could be sure mine would be straight and stand up.  let that set up a bit.
5. dipe the marshmallow into the chocolate, take it out, tap gently on the side of the container to get the excess off then roll in sprinkle that are in a small bowl.
6. set on parchment paper.

not really hard once i figured a few things out!  stay tuned for the final project with these - goodies for pezza's classmates and a few of my neighbors!