I was at this little market in Lemon Grove called “Farmer’s Market” to pick up some carne asada for dinner tonight when I noticed they were selling boxes of stem-on strawberries for $2.99 a pack (which had about 20 strawberries in it). I immediately thought of chocolate covered strawberries and bought a box to dip myself. I went across the street to Alberston’s to get a bag of chocolate chips (they didn’t have my favorite, Guittard, so I settled for Ghirardelli). They had a station inside the store with a girl making chocolate covered strawberries for Valentine’s Day – 6 strawberries for $12.99! What a rip off. Mine cost $6.49 for the box of strawberries and a bag of chocolate and I have leftover chocolate for another day. Score.
They’re so pretty with the long stems on them!
I actually made 2 batches – I made 6 at Jake’s earlier and then made the rest when I got home. I wasn’t going to make any at Jake’s until he asked me why I wasn’t making any – he had told me he wouldn’t eat any. After he asked me about it I made a few for a trial run and he ended up eating three of the strawberries – hah!
I’ve learned that the “trick” to melting chocolate on the stove is to turn the heat all the way down after the water comes to a boil – it should just be barely roiling. Anything higher can scorch the chocolate which is an unhappy situation.
This is my assistant, trying to sniff my strawberries.
Sorry, puppy assistants do not get chocolate.
I had some leftover white chocolate at home so decided to experiment using both chocolates. The strawberries were really juicy and perfect and tasted awesome with the chocolate on top. So, so good!
Make some for yourself and your sweetie and avoid overpriced strawberries at the store! Happy Valentine’s Day!
So lovely! Happy Valentine’s Day!
Chocolate covered strawberries, especially when the berries are sweet, are the best. Yours look beautiful!
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
mmmm nice! and fun! I love your cooking creativity 🙂 So looks like you put a ceramic bowl over the boiling pan of water? I remember there was some trick to getting chocolate to stay sort of shiny after it cools. I made a chocolate cake once where I poured the melted chocolate over the top. That was a long time ago though and I can’t remember how I did it!
melissa – yes, i melted the chocolate over boiling water (on low heat). for chocolate cakes and things, you probably did a ganache, which is chocolate + hot cream + butter. that makes it shiny and harden up a bit – pretty & tasty! see: http://www.joyofbaking.com/ganache.html 🙂
happy belated valentine’s! my husband made me dark chocolate dipped strawberries yesterday. it was a miracle. he melted a dark chocolate bar i had (trader joe’s) and it came out pretty good.