Chocolates & Confections Week 6 Day 1

This week was pretty laid back for some reason. On Day 1, we made dragees, rochers, and prepared the marzipan truffles.

The dragees are caramelized almonds coated with chocolate. A mixture of sugar syrup is cooked to a certain temperature. Once it hits 230F, almonds are tossed in and the whole thing is stirred like crazy.

Eventually, the sugar will crystallize and form a white, sugar crystal coating on the almonds.
We then turn down the heat to medium-low and continue cooking the almonds. Eventually, the sugar coating starts to melt, and turn into a translucent caramel coating...

...We add a bit of butter which causes them to separate into individual pieces and give them a nice gloss. They are spread out on the silpat to cool, then put in the fridge. In the meantime, we temper some dark chocolate for the coating.
The chilled almonds are coated with three layers of chocolate.

We try to keep them separated into individual pieces. To finish them off, we coat them with a mixture of powdered sugar and cocoa powder.

These are SUPER addictive! It's a delicious egg-free, gluten-free snack...except to those with nut allergies. Then soynuts can be used instead.

The Rochers are slivered almonds coated with liquor and sugar, then toasted in the oven til golden. The mixture is coated with tempered chocolate, then formed into little mounds that resemble campfire.

We used amaretto liquor, which enhanced the almond flavor. This was pretty addictive as well.

Tomorrow, we finish our marzipan truffles. We make ours with fresh almonds--other nuts can be substituted as well, such as pistachio, walnuts, and hazelnuts.