Ginger and Chocolate

Well, I ran my infamous pick a number between 1 and a 100 on Friday, and the ever bubbly DL won. Of course, she chose ginger sparklers which just came out of the oven. So, she'll be receiving these tomorrow. They turned out quite well, but if I decide to follow through on the farmers market thing, I'm going to have to get quicker at rolling them and sugaring them.

In the course of things on Friday, DL mentioned that the boss's birthday was coming up and that by golly we need to bake something for him. Well, since my review is done and there's nothing I can do to change things, I said sure... why not. I decided on truffles for a couple of reasons. First, I haven't done them in about 2 years (for good reason) and second I had 3 boxes of Bakers Semi-Sweet chocolate I needed to use up.

Making truffles is a giant pain in the ass, but I did it to myself. First you chop/crush up the chocolate. In this case, I put the blocks into a freezer bag and beat it down with my meat tenderizer. The results of this stress relief session and a healthy dollop of whupping (sic) cream go into a double boiler... or what passes for one if you don't have a double boiler. You then stir gently and constantly till it's a shiny, consistent colour. Next comes the butter. Lots and lots of butter, which you slowly add and stir in. Once all the butter has been added you remove it from the heat to cool before you add the vanilla.

When all is said and done, you get a large bowl of chocolate that has to be cooled so you can roll it. Tomorrow is when it gets really messy, and I'll likely end up covered in choclate. I did steal some gloves from work so as to keep my hands a little clean, but experience has taught me that is pretty much in vain.

Well, back to work tomorrow. Nail is off this week :p and the Dutch Nasty should be in. Who knows, maybe by the end of the month we'll have a week with four people on support again.

Probably just jinxed us. Crap.

End Transmission.