Darienne

Hi Chris, Good idea to thin the chocolate. However, the marshmallows aren't 'fastened' to the lollie stick as a hard candy would be and the whole process of dipping them is a bit tricky, especially in a small Revolation. I just dipped two for fun and non too carefully either. dhardy123 sent me this amazing online source of lollipops and I am sure to find one to make there that is simpler than dipping marshmallows.

Made some orange marshmallows to dip in chocolate for a friend. Stuck two on lollipop sticks and dipped them into chocolate. They do take a LOT of chocolate to cover. And are not suitable for easy wrapping...or long storage life.

Thank you, kind sir.

Thank you dhardy123. Could you please explain a bit more what I am looking at in the photo? Thanks.

Thanks for the replies. I forgot...AGAIN...to click on the 'watch this topic' thingy. Have yet to talk to the librarian. I also thought of homemade 'tootsie pops'. And I have found a recipe for those wonderful swirly colored pops but haven't looked at it yet. And no nuts. Public institutions are very careful these days.

Some input is required, please. I have been making lollipops for our local regional library for a couple of years now. They are molded and colored according to holiday season and have been a big hit with the kids (and parents) and a small source of extra income to the cash-strapped library. The lollipops must fit into certain parameters, both for the library purposes and mine: no nuts, not too expensive to make or sell, not too big, easy storage, not a pain to wrap...brain won't come up with what might be other considerations at this point. So I've made every color and flavor of hard tack, in detailed plastic molds and flat outline-type molds. And I've made butterscotch too. I could make caramel-wrapped, chocolate-dipped pretzel rods...but they are expensive and time-consuming to make, need special sleeves for presentation. I think popcorn might well be out for allergy reasons, plus not easy for wrapping?? Seem to recall popcorn lollies... What other kinds of lollipops...or other confections that would fit into this category...can I make? St. Patrick's is coming up.

The temperature was 250 degrees. I did not shock the pan. I'll have to look that one up. The instructions said: remove from heat. Turn out onto the prepared surface and cool to room temperature. I did turn it out onto oiled marble. The candy was already butterscotch color. OK. Got 'shock the pan'. But the color was already set. Don't understand how it fits here. Thanks for the help.

I was using a thermometer and took the pot off the stove at exactly the correct temperature.

Hi Ruth, Lisa says perhaps it was too hot and you suggest that perhaps it was too slow, aka heat too low I would guess??? OK. The heat was medium-high and the pot was not at all too small. 4 cups of sugar, syrup & milk in a 3-quart pot. I did not time the cooking, but it did not seem overly quick or slow, but somehow I did get the caramelization. Wondering what to try a second time. Thanks. ps. Went to PastryGirl's website and found that I could email her and so I did. I'll report back.

My DH, Ed, helped me to pull it...I don't have the hands any more...and all went quite well...except for the color.

Anita Chu (Pastrygirl) has a recipe for Chinese Milk Candy in her new book Field Guide to Candy: How to Identify and Make Virtually Every Candy Imaginable. The tiny photo of the candy shows that the candy is definitely pale in color, if not quite white. It's not as white as the commercial White Rabbit candy, but still pale. I made some of Chu's recipe yesterday. Yummy...but definitely not white. Why isn't my candy white? It just looks like any other butterscotchy candy. ps. Sorry, should have posted the ingredients: 2 cups sugar; 1 cup light corn syrup; 1 cup milk; 2 T unsalted butter & 1/2 t vanilla. All used accordingly.

For my birthday party with friends a couple of years ago, I made MY OWN cake. Chocolate cake bombe, filled with two chocolate mousses: milk and dark, covered with 70% ganache, with white chocolate shavings on top. 'Partway through the massacre' ps. Kim, I hope someone is reimbursing you for all the expenses....

I can't personally add to this topic, since I am not much of a baker at all. However, fall and winter of 08-09, we lived in Moab UT, a very small unsophisticated town basically, about 5,000 swollen by a factor of gosh...I don't know what...for the tourist trade. 61 motels at last count. Tourists don't bake. Now I live near a small city in Canada, 75,000, and in any given grocery store you'll find only a very few flours of any kind: white AP, white pastry, WW...not much choice. Ditto for the sugar. However, in Moab I was stunned to find so many many different flours and sugars also. Who uses them in a town so small that there's no Wal-Mart even (a sign of shopping excellence ) and folks travel 2 hours to Grand Junction, CO to buy much of ANYTHING? I couldn't even buy a lollipop stick. Very curious.

You certainly have lucky co-workers with a lot of birthdays. Do you suppose some co-workers have more than one birthday a year because you keep on making them such beautiful cakes and things? Does someone make you a cake on your birthday?

Thanks for your answer, Percy. And I do think 'incredible' is well suited to the dishes you make. We always eat a sizable breakfast, although not always interesting. I am not usually concerned with that aspect of my morning food. Now, my morning coffee...there's where I am concerned. DH, Ed, brings me coffee in bed every morning for the past few years and for that he is beyond reproach.

Good Heavens! I am impressed. What sophisticated palates those young children have. I had to look up Paillards of chicken.

The Chinese Milk Candy is made. The candy is delicious, but it is not white. The commercial candy I bought is pure white. I would have added a few more instructions to the recipe, notes which I'll add in the margin. There is NO WAY the candy makes 50 pieces if pulled according to the directions, 1/2" rope. We made about 70 and thicker than 1/2". Worked with DH, Ed. My hands would not have stood the pulling and cutting by myself. DH had lots of ideas of how we should do it. (Some of you can see my broad smile ) Oh, last note: The candy cost next to nothing to make. The twisty waxed paper from LorAnn's was incredibly expensive!!

Thank you for the wishes. Lovely muffins and you deserve a nap!!

Thanks all for the answers. I guess I am curious because Ed, DH, and I had breakfast together for years after he retired. And he mostly made it. And it could be a bit of a production. And he could get quite ratty over the short order part of it. And then sometimes he was annoyed because it ate up (good one, just tumbled out! ) part of the morning. And increasingly we didn't eat the same things. So about three weeks ago, we called an end to this familiar pattern and life is much better. (We did have bacon and eggs together today and he made it. No way on this earth that I am cooking him a fried egg. Scrambled? That's my job.) Now he eats about an hour before I do while I work on the computer catching up. He eats hard-boiled eggs (yecch) or granola (which I make but don't eat right now on my weight loss regime). I have a low carb smoothie or lox (he hates:I love) and something or nutola (low carb sub for granola), etc. Sorry, no photos. BTW, Friday, March 5th is our 50th anniversary, so something must be going right!! I don't know about breakfast that day, but supper will be 'dessert as supper' night.

We Canucks don't have Target...as far as I know...well, not in our fair small city...and I'll look in Wal-Mart.

The key to the freezer problem is accessibility and there is so little answer to that one. Something is either behind something in an upright or under something in a chest. And the best laid plans are followed for only sooo long and then chaos reigns once more. If my DH had his way, his entire life would be one item deep in any given direction: fridge, cupboards, freezer, basement, drive shed, closets, you name it. I have reorganized that chest freezer so many times, labeled stuff...no such thing as a label that will not fall off...magic marked...it comes off, rubs off, becomes illegible. And just one thing hastily tossed into the mix ends up the start of the ensuing chaos. Got some free squared off pails from the grocery store yesterday, complete with handles. Maybe....

Have to ask someone. Anyone. Where do you all find the time and energy to make such incredible breakfasts? And how often do you do it? And how early do you have to be at work? And do you really feel like going to that much trouble in the morning? And do you really care what you eat in the morning? Thanks. ps. Not to mention photographing your breakfast too!

DH and I know nothing about Vita Mixes. He just picked one up at the local Transfer Station (aka the Dump) on the shelves which are free. It's been there for a couple of weeks at least. It even has a book with it. The blades work perfectly and no parts are missing. Yes. People really do leave incredible things there. We have done it ourselves. One day there were two full size working electric organs, the kind you find in a smaller church. Oh, it's an older one, the 3600. I guess I'll have to buckle down, read this topic, try the machine, see if it actually works or not. Amazing.

Because of the make-up snowstorms we have been having lately in our corner of the woods, our candy date got canceled, so I am going to have to go it alone with Chinese Milk candy this weekend. Maybe I can get DH to help pull it. Anita Chu (Pastry Girl). Field Guide to Candy.

And then there are those wonderful folks, who will eat something and enjoy it, until you tell them there is: yogurt, tofu, goat's milk, etc, in it, and then they'll literally spit it out and refuse to eat any more. How did we find such friends? (I am still hugging to myself the fact that once this particular man ate and loved my lemon cheese pie, and he still doesn't know that there was tofu and goat's milk in it. I'm saving it for just the 'right' moment. Yep, I do have a mean side. )