Peppermint infused, tempered semisweet and white chocolate topped with crushed candy canes.
I’ve got another Christmas Yumminess Countdown recipe for y’all today!
It has become a tradition in my house to have peppermint bark around the holidays. We used to buy the peppermint bark from Williams-Sonoma but it’s gotten so expensive there ($28.95!!) that I decided to try to make my own a few years ago. I found this recipe in a Food Network magazine as a copycat of Williams-Sonoma’s Peppermint Bark. And let me tell you….this really is a good copy cat! If you put it in a WS peppermint bark tin, you probably wouldn’t know the difference!
The idea behind peppermint bark is really simple…just two layers of chocolate with peppermint flavor. However, you can’t just melt chocolate to get the two layers. You have to “temper” your chocolate in order to be able to store it at room temperature and have it not melt in your hand. Tempering your chocolate requires you to melt the chocolate and get it up to a certain temperature and then slowly cooling it and adding more untempered chocolate to stabilize the chocolate. If you have ever used candy melts, that is pre-tempered chocolate. So why not use candy melts? Well you can but it doesn’t taste as good because it isn’t very good quality chocolate. Also they flavor the white candy melts vanilla, so it tastes sort of funky with both vanilla and peppermint going on at once.
I explain how to temper chocolate in the recipe. If something goes wrong and the chocolate refuses to set at room temperature, you can always just put it in the fridge to set. It won’t have the same glossy finish and snap to it but it will still taste good! The one thing to really be careful about is not letting any water get into your chocolate. Chocolate and water do not mix.
While it is a much cheaper than WS, it still isn’t cheap to make at home. If you use quality chocolate you will still end up spending about $20ish. Even if you don’t use the best quality chocolate, please please please don’t use chocolate chips! They don’t melt quite right because they are meant to keep their shape when they bake in cookies. So do at least buy bar chocolate. I like to use Ghirardelli’s baking chocolate bars.
Happy holidays y’all!
- 12 oz semisweet chocolate, chopped*
- 16 oz white chocolate, chopped*
- 1½ teaspoon peppermint extract, divided
- 4 candy canes, crushed
- Line 9 x 13 in baking dish with aluminum foil shiny side up.
- Heat 1 in. of water in saucepan over low heat until boiling.
- Put ⅔rds of the semisweet chocolate in a double boiler pot or in a heatproof bowl that sits on top of your saucepan.
- Place the chocolate over the boiling water (the bottom of your double boiler or bowl should not touch the water) and stir until completely melted plus another minute or 2 to get the chocolate up to around 120°F.
- Remove the chocolate from the heat and stir in the remaining semisweet chocolate a few pieces at a time.
- Stir until all of the chocolate is melted and is cooled to around 85°F. I stirred my chocolate for about 5 minutes after all the chunks were melted.
- To check that it is tempered, dip a spoon in the chocolate and if the chocolate sets in about 5 minutes, then you've tempered it correctly. It should look so glossy that it appears like it is still melted chocolate, but when you touch it, it has dried.
- Stir in ¾ teaspoon of peppermint extract.
- Pour the semisweet chocolate into the lined pan and let sit for about 10 minutes or until it is set.
- Put ⅔rds of the white chocolate in a double boiler pot or in a heatproof bowl that sits on top of your saucepan.
- Place the chocolate over the boiling water (the bottom of your double boiler or bowl should not touch the water) and stir until all of it is melted or until it is 105°F. You won't add an extra minute or 2 like for the semisweet because it's white chocolate and you don't want it going past 105°F.
- Remove the chocolate from the heat and stir in the remaining white chocolate a few pieces at a time.
- Stir until all of the chocolate is melted and is cooled to around 85°F. I stirred my chocolate for about 5 minutes after all the chunks were melted.
- To check that it is tempered, dip a spoon in the chocolate and if the chocolate sets in about 5 minutes then you've tempered it correctly. It should look so glossy that it appears like it is still melted chocolate, but when you touch it, it has dried.
- Stir in ¾ teaspoon of peppermint extract.
- Spread the chocolate over the set semisweet chocolate in the pan and sprinkle the crushed candy canes on top. Press down a little with your hands to make sure the candy canes stick but not so much that your hands get chocolatey.
- Let the chocolate completely set for an 1 hour.
- Store at room temperature.
Adapted from Food Network
This looks really good!