Willy Wonka Again

For my parents' 50th wedding anniversary, I offered to make some chocolates for our guests. We'll be giving bags of them out to each guest, so I have to make about 750 of them. That's a lot of chocolates, and I'm looking forward to every minute of it. I just ordered 30 lbs. of chocolate today for a great price--20 of dark chocolate and 10 of milk. I also put in an order for some polycarbonate molds. If there's one thing I've learned through woodworking, you get what you pay for, and it pays to have the right tools. Polycarbonate molds are what the pros use--you can't get any better than these and I shopped around to find the best price on these as well. I bought three different kinds. One is a geodesic design that I know my dad will enjoy and the other two are standard chocolate shapes.

I decided to go with the molds because I won't have to deal with the time consuming process of dipping them, which takes a really long time. With the molds I'll be able to be systematic and be able to do 120 chocolates in one fell swoop. Easy as pie. First day: temper the chocolate in the chocolate machine, then fill the molds, invert them and let them set. Second day: make the ganache filling and fill each individual chocolate. Time consuming, but not as painfully so as cutting and dipping individual chocolates would be. Third day: cover the molds again with tempered chocolate--that will take about five minutes of my time. Fourth day: flip over and unmold. Bingo! 120 perfect chocolates!

The molds and the chocolate should be here by the end of the week and next week, I'll begin my chocolate making in earnest, and I'll be sure to document the process on my blog. I'm looking forward to it.