Christmas Candy Corn and Oreo Bark

Who doesn't love candy bark? One of the most often searched and viewed recipes on my blog is my Halloween Candy Corn Bark. When I saw Holiday Candy Corn at Michael's I had to buy it to create a Christmas version.

This is all you need to make some tasty Christmas cookie and candy corn bark. If you like salty with your sweet, toss in some pretzels in this mix too. That's the great thing about bark...completely customizable.

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The Wizarding Week of Harry Potter

My oldest son loves Harry Potter. This is him decked out in his Quidditch robe at Dragon*Con last year. He's loved Harry since he was barely two years old. His early affection can be blamed on HBO's constant running of The Sorcerer's Stone. It captivated him. We took him to see The Chamber of Secrets in the theater and it may very well have been his first movie theater experience. When Hagrid returns to the dining room cheers in the final scene my little boy stood up and cried because he knew the movie was ending.

Fast forward five years when Thing One is 8 years old he began reading the Harry Potter books. He had never seen any movies beyond those first two in all the years between. When he began the books his Harry Pottter love was reborn with an unquenching thirst. He voraciously read the books from the library. And soon wanted to own them all. 

Here he is with one of his favorite birthday presents on his ninth birthday, the remaining six books he could keep. Once he had completed reading the series we rented the Prisoner of Azkabam through the Half-Blood Prince for him to watch. He already knew disappointment from a book converted to film but was satisfied with the adaptation of Harry Potter.

The second Harry Potter Thing One ever saw in a movie theater was the first he actually remembers: The Deathly Hallows, Part One. He was over joyed and immediately a year long conversation began about seeing the final film. And during this year his Harry Potter love manifested in new ways.


His closet shrine for instance.

With a shelf dedicated to all thing Harry Potter.

His painted pumpkin for last Halloween was an homage to Harry Potter.

His Halloween costume last year even came with a request to cut his shaggy locks shorter and spray his hair dark.

And more recently our Museum of Natural History hosted a Wizards and Witches Weekend and he committed again to a costume as a Hogwarts student.

So as the date grew close for the end of Harry Potter in cinema we discussed the idea of a Harry Potter viewing party complete with Harry Potter snacks. I made a grave error in this discussion forgetting each film is approximately two and a half hours long. No one would come to a party to watch over 21 hours of videos. Oy! How would I tell my dear boy his party could not happen? Then I had another idea I pitched first to my man. A Wizarding Week of Harry Potter! We'd determine what day his father would be taking him to see the new movie then count back seven days and show one movie and serve one themed snack per day. My man was on board and I presented it to Thing One. He was sold!

Well, today is the day my man takes my biggest little man to see the end of Harry Potter. I imagine this may be a tad bitttersweet for him but I'm glad to have wrapped the event around some fabulous memories. Here's how his Wizarding Week went....

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April Fools' Breakfast

This year for April Fools' Day I decided to do a candy breakfast. It was inspired off this idea from Family Fun magazine. Following their directions I created the miniature candy breakfast you see here. But I thought I could make a few modifications to the bacon.

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Star Wars Rice Crispy Treats

Thing One had Rice Krispies for breakfast this morning. The sight of the box made Thing Two about bounce off the floor with the idea to make rice crispy treats...shaped like the Millennium Falcon and TIE Fighter. Thing Two would be the one with the Star Wars bedroom and Death Star birthday cake, in case you hadn't connected the dots.

He then promptly ran to the cabinet and retrieved this lovely box my man gave me for Christmas.

Inside it has Millennium Falcon and TIE Fighter sandwich cutters. I heart it but...

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Chocolate-Peanut Butter Filled Chocolate Hearts

I love frosting. I can't throw out leftover icing from a delicious cake I made. Currently there was a container of scrumptious chocolate-peanut butter butter cream from my man's birthday cake in the refrigerator begging for new life.

It was reborn inside Valentine chocolates!

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Ham Solo in CandyBaronite

I'm a fifteen year vegetarian married to a bacon loving omnivore. This doesn't cause conflict since he genuinely loves eating good vegetarian meals and I also indulge the meat beast within him from occasion. One such occasion of indulgence bore Ham Solo in CandyBaronite!

I was initially just considering dipping bacon in chocolate to make Christmas goodies.

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Thanks for the Spooky Leftovers in the Pantry

Leftover candy creation time!

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Candy Corn Pudding Cups

I think this will be my last Halloween inspired goodie of twenty-ten. *sniff* I do love Halloween so much. However, every moment of Autumn is awesome, my favorite season of all. This morning I decided to whip up one last surprise for the kiddos before the onslaught of CANDY!

I stood on the pudding aisle earlier this week and thought of all the layered Jello candy corn inspired treats I've seen. Why not pudding? French Vanilla has a yellow hue.  And Butterscotch is in the orange family. I knew there was a tub of cool whip waiting at home already.

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Candy Corn Brownies

The candy corn must be gone by the end of October. I thought baking some of them in brownies would be a festive and yummy thing to do. The kids were obviously in full support of this plan. I did regular candy corn on top of mini brownie muffins and caramel candy corn on top of a pan of brownies. While I do have several brownie recipes from scratch, these were from a box. But not just any box, Ghirardelli Double Chocolate Brownie mix.  Love this brownie mix! If you've never tried it you need to change that. It's so tasty on its own but if you have Heath toffee bits, you should throw a handful in the brownie batter for a truly mouth altering experience. But I digress; this is about candy corn!

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Candy Corn Bark

I had the unoriginal idea to make candy corn bark. Seems from a quick search on the Internet this is done often when the love it or hate it October candy is aplenty. Nonetheless I gave it a go from my own pantry.

I had a couple bags of white Wilton candy melts, a bag of candy corn, some festive orange and black sprinkles and a bag of Halloween colored Oreos.

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I Like Candy, Part Two: Darth Vader

In my previous post I mentioned the start of my new found curiosity for making candies and chocolates. It was all a lead up to this entry. I needed a reason to make a solid Darth Vader mask out of black chocolate. And I found it. My friend's fortieth birthday. He's a Star Wars fan; he'd appreciate it. I was very excited. I had plans to make Vader from a mix of milk chocolate and Bailey's Irish Cream. I was melting my large amount of chocolate over a double boiler fashioned from a large bowl when my bowl tipped, steam slipped inside the lip of the bowl, and my chocolate seized. I blogged about that mistake and the resulting yummy truffles here. What I didn't mention in the blog entry was in addition to the truffles, before I froze the chocolate seizure, I scooped out more and pressed the Bailey's-chocolate into my Han Solo in Carbonite candy mold. 

All his features didn't turn out perfect since the chocolate wasn't pourable and therefore unable to reach the small voids. However, after a toss in cocoa I thought he was decent enough to take pictures of with toys. And eat. I mean, come on, he's made of milk chocolate and Baileys. I think a dip in a hot cup of coffee would be the perfect way to release Han. 

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I Like Candy, Part One: A Hunger Born

I was going to post about my chocolate creation this past weekend but thought I should do a first post to explain how this whole candy thing started. I've been baking and decorating shaped cakes for years for family and friends. Never for money or request. That makes me nervous as a long tail cat in a room full of rocking chairs since I'm self-taught, my only lessons being watching my mom decorate cakes when I was growing up in the eighties. Fast forward to this past February when my super fab next door neighbor asked if I'd bake a cake for her son's fourth birthday party. She said she'd pay. Oh my. I told her I'd do it for just the cost of ingredients and still felt trepidation. The theme was Lego; the design left to me. 

Originally I thought I'd do a giant Lego brick cake. Have you seen them? Basically a sheet cake with cupcakes on top all iced a solid color. Effective but I thought maybe I could do better. I did have a silicone cake mold of a Lego Man I had purchased at Lego Land. Maybe I could use that. I did a test bake in the mold and realized it would not work with cake. Cute as a brownie. But with added buttercream icing, because I do not, will not do fondant, the details would be lost. 

Then an idea occurred to me. CANDY! I'd always seen the bag of Wilton Candy Melts on the cake aisle at Michael's. Maybe I could make a candy man from the mold. And I did. And it was easy. And it was awesome! Then I made candy Lego bricks from a Lego ice cube mold. 

The cake was a big hit. And a candy love was born.

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Chocolate Seizure

I've started experimenting with candy molds and candy making. This weekend is a friend's 40th birthday and I thought he'd appreciate a large chocolate Darth Vader mask. Since I make a tasty Bailey's Irish Cream-Chocolate Mousse, I thought I could make Vader have that same Bailey's flavor. However, the large quantity of chocolate I was trying to melt with the alcohol over a makeshift double boiler did not want to cooperate. My bowl tilted over my pot of boiling water, steam came inside and the chocolate seized. Ugh. I was not happy.

The chocolate looked ugly, and definitely could not be poured into a mold. But it was SO yummy. I rolled up a few balls of the difficult chocolate and let them harden in the freezer. Then I rolled them in a little cocoa to make a Bailey's-Chocolate Truffle. I froze the rest of the chocolate and soon I'll make more small truffles. I'm thinking I need to bake them inside a cupcake like I did the buckeyes last month. Can you imagine them dropped in to the middle of a mocha cupcake with a homemade Bailey's buttercream frosting? *drools* I'll keep you posted when I make those babies, for sure. 

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