Friday 7 December 2012

Sweet Memories...

...are made of this: chocolate!

Earlier this week, my Mum, my sister and I went to a one-evening course about how to make your own pralinés. It was held at my old school (yes, the same complex of buildings I visited not long ago) in the school's kitchen.

The lady who held the course works as a cook in a rather posh restaurant near Stuttgart. She was expecting 16 participants, but there ended up being only twelve of us, which was alright as far as I was concerned - because said lady, nice as she was and certainly good at cooking and baking and all things food, was of the extremely disorganised and erratic kind who never do one thing after the other but try to be everywhere at the same time and do everything at the same time - and fail.

You could already tell from a look at the print-outs with the recipes she gave everyone; there was first a list of ingredients for each recipe and then the description of what to do in which order. Sounds good? Yes... in theory. In reality, though, there suddenly appeared ingredients in the description that had not been part of the list, and some of what you were supposed to be doing was worded unclearly and didn't sound logical at all.
At one point, while our teacher happened to be in our corner, my Mum asked her whether the nuts should be added to the mixture now; she said "yes" and so my Mum did that, only to hear five seconds later that, no, the nuts were actually meant only for decoration and not as part of the mixture... 

Never mind! Everyone had fun, and we ended up with so many different kinds of VERY delicious pralinés and truffles and sweets that it is hard to say which one I liked best!
I made these.

The round chocolate hollows were the only ready-made thing we had; various fillings were made for them.

Caramelised almonds. Quite easy to make, and all you need is sugar and almonds.

These were filled with home-made marzipan (the only sweets I do not care for).

Don't these look fantastic? I'd never be able to make them like this!






A close-up of the ones I made.

My Mum had a temporary adoptive daughter for that evening; when we split into smaller groups, a very pretty girl asked us whether she could join the three of us in our corner. And of course we had nothing against it - meeting new people is part of the fun of taking such a course, isn't it! 

The results of our work were sisterly shared among our group of twelve women, and I am not ashamed to admit that the entire contents of the tin I took home with me was gone by last night :-) 

PS: Correction - the teacher of this course does not work at a posh restaurant, but at the academy's cafeteria sharing the same location. Thanks goes to my sister for pointing out my misinterpretation of what the teacher had said at the beginning.

30 comments:

  1. Oh yum, Meike! Yours is the second fascinating post I've read recently about making chocolates and I'm so tempted to have a go myself. Those look delicious.

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    1. Most of them were not difficult to make. I think for most people the biggest challenge when making these at home will be to find enough space for cooling them.

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  2. oh man, ich werd ganz rot! danke für das kompliment, hat wirklich sehr viel spaß mit euch gemacht :)

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  3. Even though I'm not really a chocoholic, this might be too much temptation for me. And I notice you were wearing a chocolate colored sweater! To honor the theme? to make it less easy to see if some chocolate fell upon it? It sounds like a delicious experience!

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    1. Kristi, you noticed!! I had indeed the evening course in mind when I got dressed that morning :-) It was the chocolate-caramel theme I was aiming for.

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  4. Meike, I am shocked! How could anyone not like marzipan? It's my favourite!! And German marzipan is the best. The absolute best! :o)


    oxo Carol

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    1. Never liked it! My late Grandma loved it, and my Dad loves it. I have made marzipan at home as a gift for them, but I still don't like it myself.

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  5. yum! I've never tasted marzipan, but I've thought they might be tasty. Hmm, and not a person I know makes them. what fun to do this with your mum!

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    1. It was her idea, she organized us going to the course and she paid for it as a gift to my sister and me. A fun and useful way of spending time together!

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  6. Looks like you had a "sweet" and fun time! The chocolates look delicious too!

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    1. We did, Mary! And they were all delicious, although I was not quite as fond of the raspberry filled ones; I preferred the "nutty" ones :-)

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    1. After having tasted all that lovely sweet stuff, as soon as I was home, I made myself a cheese sandwich :-)

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  8. Chocolate, now you are talking my language! :-)
    Why, oh why, can't I find classes such as this one? The whole world should be involved in such a thing. Peace, Love and Chocolate...I should make t-shirts!
    Your Mum's hands covered in chocolate reminded me of the very funny episode from I LOVE LUCY where Lucy & Ethel worked in a chocolate factory. You should look it up on Youtube, it's so funny!

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    1. Oh I'm sure someone in your area offers similar classes, Kay. If not - well, get yourself a book about how to make chocolates, and then you put together a group of friends and you all have fun making your own pralinés :-)
      I just did look at the I love Lucy episode. It wasn't quite like that, our teacher was much nicer than the supervisor in the series ;-)

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  9. Now please enter us all in a chocolatey draw!

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    1. Good idea, Frances - but not with the choccies we made, those are all gone :-)

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  10. Everything looks so good! At least, in the kitchen, but not on my hips.

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    1. They tasted as good as they looked, messymimi.

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  11. Chocolate! I should take a course like that, I love chocolate! I see my mom is already following you...she's saucysiciliana. I'm glad you like my version better than Buddy Holly:) Thank you.

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    1. Hello Caramella, how nice of you to pop in! You are welcome. Buddy Holly has all my love and respect for what he gave to music, but you did a very good job there.

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  12. They all look delicious. I'm allergic to some kinds of nuts but not almonds... And I quite like marsipan. Don't dare make sweets like these myself now because I can't trust myself not to eat too many of them :) (best way for me to avoid temptation is not to have the things that tempt me close at hand!)

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    1. Almonds are, botanically speaking, not nuts. RJ is allergic to nuts, too, but not to almonds.
      A wise decision not to put yourself too close to anything tempting :-)

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  13. Did you have nice fresh almonds? A year ago a customer sent me about five pounds of fresh almonds (they are growers of them) and I make herb and oil roasted bags of almonds for everyone , wonderful with a drink or cider at the holidays. These look so good. I like the nut part best too; what a productive evening!
    xx
    julie

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    1. The caramelized almonds were made in a different corner of the kitchen, therefore I don't really know how fresh they were when the ladies in that corner started making them.
      Your herb and oil roasted ones sound lovely!

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  14. I once had some chocolates hand made by a friend and they were so, so much better than even the most expensive commercial chocolates I have ever tried. No comparison. I am sure if I had had a box of them they'd have been gone by now too!

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    1. Yes, nothing beats home-made and hand-made, does it!

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  15. As a recovering chocoholic who has not over-indulged for nearly 10 years that would have been so very tempting. I am now off to make coffee and have a piece (yes, a piece) of plain chocolate!

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    1. I admire your self-discipline in that matter, Graham!
      When it comes to sweets, I'm afraid I know no restraint.

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