Bfth Makes a Mess: Dessert Edition

I love cranberry sauce (even though I can't eat turkey).  I LOVE chocolate.  (Which is why it is such a sacrifice to give it up for Lent every year).  So when I heard of an "easy" dessert to make, chocolate covered cranberry sauce, I was all in.  


I was all in all right.  I was all in a MESS.

There are multiple variations of the recipe.  All call for a can of cranberry sauces.  All call for chocolate; be it dark chocolate chips or milk.  Some call for coconut oil.  Those that do say it is optional.  Since I didn't have any in the house I opted out.  Maybe I shouldn't have.

I bought the cranberry sauce (no whole berry).  I bought dark chocolate chips.  I bought semi-sweet chips.  I bought milk chocolate.  I had visions of wonderful chocolate covered discs of cranberry sauce.  That is all they were visions...



I decided NOT to wait until right before Thanksgiving to give it a go, as the recipes said they could be stored in a freezer for a month.  The one good decision I made, as now there is still time to try something else.  (OH how I hate when things don't turn out as I envisioned them...or even close to what I envision.)

Here's what I did...

I opened the can of cranberry sauce.  Okay, I actually had my husband so it so it would come out in one "piece."  I knew I would never be able to do it.  I had it on a plate and I did my best (which was not good enough) to cut into 8 equal pieces.  My first "slice" didn't turn out well.  I slowly got better, but I ended up with 9 pseudo slices.  (One of the recipes I found said if you didn't have slices, you could just have spooned "mounds"...maybe that would have worked better?)  Slices were put on a baking sheet covered in parchment paper and put in the freezer.

After dinner (so the cranberry slices had been in the freezer for several hours), I melted down the chocolate in a large Pyrex measuring cup. I used dark chocolate chips.  The recipe calls for 16 ounces of chocolate chips.  Bag sizes are 10 ounces.   So I decided to start with one bag and if I needed more as I went along, I could ad in the semi-sweet. I did as directed, microwaving for short stints and stirring so that the chocolate was smooth.  (Or smoothish).  

As recommended, I took a fork and dipped a slice into the chocolate.  Or tried to.  It fell in and the chocolate didn't want to stick.  I'm fishing around trying to get it out and it's tearing and starting to melt a bit (the chocolate is HOT).  I ended up plopping it back on the baking sheet and trying to "pat" some chocolate on to both sides.  In NO WAY was it coated.

Maybe the chocolate wasn't melted enough?  So I put back in the microwave and got it even "creamier".  I tried again.  Still no luck.  I tried to "spoon" on chocolate, which kind of worked.  At least on one side.

I added and melted more chips.  The chocolate was hot, but still not "sticking" to the cranberry sauce slices, which were getting melty and drippy.  I kept burning myself trying to spoon the chocolate, which never was smooth enough, onto the rounds.

I did what I could, which was not pretty, and shoved them back in the freezer, where they are supposed to be good for at least a month.  I intend on taking them off the sheet (because it takes up too much room) and put them in a container in the freezer.  Maybe someone will be brave enough to try one?

To completely embarrass myself, here is what they looked like. 

 


Nothing at all like the pretty picture(s) that accompanied the recipe I used.  (Or any of the recipes I checked out.)

How do they taste?  I have tried them yet.  They were supposed to be for Thanksgiving.  Dare I try them on my family? 

It's probably time to give another dessert a go. (This makes last year's chocolate pecan pie look pretty good:  https://bfthsboringblog.blogspot.com/2024/11/thanksgiving-good-bad-and-different.html)  Luckily I try to have more than one dessert around.  So it's back to the tried and true.  The pumpkin bread (really cake) which I plan to make WITHOUT the maple cream cheese filling and instead drizzle a little of the maple cream from our local maple syrup business.  And there's also the no bake cheese cake.  (All I have to do is scoop the billing into a pre-made graham cracker crust...even I can do that.)  Time to head back to the grocery store!

No matter what, no one will go hungry here.  (Wish I could say that for all the world, but...)  I may not make "pretty" food, but it's usually tasty, even if it looks pretty weird!

(Note:  I am willing to entertain suggestions as to how I might do better next time, IF there is a next time, but I am not ready for brutal criticism.  The world is mean enough as it is.  Be kind.  Thank you.)

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