Did you know that there is a whole day dedicated to indulging in chocolate-covered treats?
National Chocolate Covered Anything Day occurs annually on December 16th. Take your favorite foods, fruits, or snacks and dip them in delicious, decadent chocolate.
Are you a lover of chocolate-covered strawberries, pretzels, or something a little more unique? Today’s all about indulging in that sweet, chocolatey goodness!
Get ready to treat yourself!
What is National Chocolate Covered Anything Day?
This is on 16th December marked as national Chocolate-Covered Anything Day. It’s one of the tastiest holidays that allows indulgence in chocolate-coated food. Therefore, it is all about candies and chocolates coated with nuts or even pretzels by mouth-watering chocolate.
What are origins of Chocolate-Covered Foods?
Chocolate coating is one of those inventions done ages ago when people used to drink chocolates.
With time, its use had developed from being consumed by people through drinking to being used for coating products and was found popularly in the 19th century.
Chocolate-coated products are loved all over the world from simple coated food such as strawberries or chocolates with ice-cream fillings to recently found types like marshmallow-coated chocolates.
How to make homemade chocolate-covered treats?
Homemade chocolate-covered treats are extremely easy and fun to make. Here is how you can do this:
- Select Your Treat: Determine what you would like to coat with chocolate. Many things may be covered such as fruits, including strawberries, bananas, or apples. Nuts such as almonds and cashews can also be dipped into the chocolate or even pretzels.
- Melt Chocolate: Chop up your chocolate and melt. Super easy in the microwave chop, heat in 20-30 second increments, stir between each heat or set up a double boiler on your stovetop
- Dip Your Treats: Place your favorite treats in melted chocolate. That they are all well-coated with at least a good amount of it and take them by your fork or skewer when wet.
- Chill Them Down: Place the dipped treats on a tray. Chill down to room temperature or chill in the refrigerator for crunchier snaps sooner.
- Optional Toppings: Add flavor using crushed nuts, sprinkles, or sea salt before the chocolate hardens.
And that is your chocolate-covered delight!
Best Chocolate Brands to Use for Chocolate-Covered Foods
Good quality chocolate, be it of taste and mouthfeel, makes proper chocolate-covered foods. Some of the best among them are:
- Ghirardelli: Ghirardelli provides different kinds of chocolate, from dark to milk and even white, offering smoothness and richness to the flavor.
- Lindt: This is Lindt chocolate, it is rich, smooth, melts well. Hence, best to coat fruits, nuts, etc.
- Godiva: Godiva is luxury chocolate. Their chocolates are very smooth, silky, and perfect for dipping or coating.
- Valrhona: Valrhona is a fine French chocolate company that provides dark, milk, and white flavors with strong taste, perfect for gourmet chocolate enrobing candies.
- Hershey’s: This is the best for general chocolate enrobing of food because it melts well and has a great flow. Hershey’s milk chocolate and dark are both perfect.
- Baker’s: Great for baking and coating, Baker’s delivers exceptional baking chocolate that melts beautifully and does contain that deep, rich cocoa flavor.
You can’t go wrong with any of them so ensure that your chocolate cover is both scrumptious and pleasurable to enjoy.
Best Chocolate Brands to Use for Chocolate-Covered Foods
Good quality chocolate, be it of taste and mouthfeel, makes proper chocolate-covered foods. Some of the best among them are:
- Ghirardelli: Ghirardelli provides different kinds of chocolate, from dark to milk and even white, offering smoothness and richness to the flavor.
- Lindt: This is Lindt chocolate, it is rich, smooth, melts well. Hence, best to coat fruits, nuts, etc.
- Godiva: Godiva is premium chocolate. Their chocolates are very smooth, silky, and great for dipping or coating.
- Valrhona: Valrhona is a high-end French chocolate house offering dark, milk, and white flavors with intense flavor, great for gourmet chocolate enrobing candies
- Hershey’s: This is great for general food chocolate enrobing as it melts well and has a great flow. Hershey’s milk chocolate and dark are both excellent.
- Baker’s: Great for baking and coating, Baker’s delivers great baking chocolate that melts very well and does contain that deep, rich cocoa flavor.
You can’t go wrong with any of them so make sure your chocolate cover is both scrumptious and pleasurable to enjoy.
How to Mix Chocolate with Snacks Like Chips, Popcorn, or Pretzels
Chocolate mixed with snacks like chips, popcorn, or pretzels is perfect-just the right mixture of sweet and salty. Here is how.
- Chips: Take some of your favorite chocolate-dark or milk-and melt it down. Then drizzle that over a plate of plain potato chips. It does so perfectly blend in together, the salty crunch to the smooth sweet chocolate. Then one might even go along and dip that single chip into melted chocolate.
- Popcorn: Fresh popped popcorn. Toss in melted chocolate and make it an irresistible piece of candy. Sprinkle a bit of sea salt or even caramel over the chocolate-covered popcorn with that flavor zing on top.
- Pretzels: Great to dip pretzels into melted chocolate. Take your miniature or regular pretzels and drizzle chocolate over them or coat them completely and let them sit on parchment paper so they harden.
Best Chocolate Pairing for Events
- Movie Night: Those can be dipped using either the popcorn or pretzels from one’s movie night. That’s because the rich crunch from both popcorn and pretzels would be wonderfully evened out by the milk chocolate.
- Holiday Gatherings: Sea salt and dark chocolate, caramel-dipped pretzels for a holiday gathering. Which is, if someone wanted to be indulgent using sophisticated pairing.
- It goes great with wine or champagne: You will be craving that romantic dinner over chili or cinnamon dark chocolate when filling up the table with such flavors so spicy fills refreshment; gift to friends-it can be prepared over some gathering party with strawberry, raspberry-all fresh fruits-over this dish in lighter versions of refreshments.
- Some of the best snack options that complement it well are milk chocolate and potato chips or crisp nuts; you do not have to go overboard to enjoy this confection.
So, these turn out to be the best chocolate substitutes if you want chocolate to be there anywhere and at any time.
Conclusion
Chocolate-covered treats come to the rescue with a heavenly presentation of the perfect combination of sweet and salty, be it over chips, popcorn, or pretzels. If you select the quality of chocolates by Ghirardelli, Lindt, or Godiva and match these flavors with snacks, you will create heavenly goodness for any occasion. Whether it’s a cozy movie night or a festive holiday gathering, these chocolate pairings will satisfy any craving and make every moment a little sweeter!
