Happy National Peppermint Patty Day!

Did you know that today, February 11th is National Peppermint Patty Day? In thinking of how to celebrate, I decided that there was no better way than to make peppermint patties of my own. Only these patties have a little bit of a twist….

Traditionally,  peppermint patties are round with a white peppermint center that is coated in dark chocolate. In honor of Valentine’s Day being a few days away, I decided to give mine a slight twist. The white center has been dyed pink and crushed up peppermint pieces have been added. The circular shape has been changed to a heart shape. These changes  transform this delicious treat into the perfect Valentine’s day gift. Forget 6 foot stuffed animals or a dozen roses, I say celebrate Valentine’s Day with the gift of peppermint patties.

Here is how I made my Pink Peppermint Patty

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Pink Peppermint Patties

adapted from Epicurious.com

makes one baking sheet full ( number will depend based on what shape you cut)

Filling

4 1/2 cups confectioners sugar

3 tbsp light corn syrup

3 1/2 tbsp water

2 tbsp shortening

2 tsp peppermint extract

2 tbsp finely crushed peppermint candies

1 drop red food coloring

Combine the above ingredient in a stand mixer, and using the paddle attachment, mix all ingredients have formed into a large ball. On a parchment paper lined baking sheet, roll out the mixture to an even thickness. Thickness is up to you, it all depends on how thick you want you patties to be. Cover with parchment and place in the freezer for half an hour or until filling is firm.

Coating

12-20 oz bittersweet baking chips ( I used 60% cacao, but you can use whatever your taste buds desire)

In a saucepan over a double boiler over simmering water melt chocolate, stirring frequently.The amount of chips you use will depend on the shape of your chocolate cut outs. Some shapes and larger surface areas, therefore using more chocolate.

I encourage you to try different shaped patties, so more chocolate is probably better to start with. After all, having extra liquid chocolate is never a bad thing. Right? Remove the filling from freezer and using cookie cutters of your choice cut out shapes. You can go the traditional circle route or do stars, Christmas trees, gingerbread men, or dinosaurs. What ever shape you desire your patties to be. I found that with larger shapes the filling needs to be very firm, so after cutting out the shapes you will probably need to return the filling to the freezer for a few minutes to firm up.

To coat your patties place your dinosaur, tree, heart or whatever shape you desire on a fork and dip into the melted chocolate. place on a parchment lined baking sheet to dry. In about an hour you will have a delicious peppermint patty of your own! Perfect for Peppermint Patty Day and as a great Valentine’s day gift!

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In addition to making patties, I also made these! I rolled the filling into a ball, covered in chocolate, and then sprinkled with crushed peppermints. In addition to it being Peppermint Patty day, I also have an announcement.

Dear Reader, As you may have noticed, over the last 2 weeks I have celebrated National Blueberry Pancake Day, and National Homemade Soup Day. There is a  National Food Day for every day of the year, so I am going to celebrate every Friday! For 1 year. I have 3 down and 49 more to go. I have created a page on the website with the schedule and results so far.

You may wonder why am I going to do this? I am looking at this project as my version of the 365 project ( you take a picture everyday for a year, usually with some kind of theme) I don’t have the time to take pictures for the blog and post every single day, so I am doing once a week. I am choosing National Food Days, because it is going to push me to shoot and create dishes I normally wouldn’t. I am not going to get to choose the subject each time, the calendar took care of that for me. I chose Friday, because it is a Fun way to end the week!

If you are interested in doing this as well I have started a Flickr Pool to post one image from each post with a link back to the post. The Schedule will be posted in the Flickr group as well as on my blog. I welcome you to join in the Fun of National Food Friday! Have a great National Peppermit Patty Day! and I look forward to bringing you National Drink Wine day next week.

- Taylor

*A note, when it comes to using chocolate, I highly suggest tempering it. For this recipe I didn’t, but in the future I am going to. In a few weeks, I am going to be using Chocolate again and will talk about tempering and show you the difference between tempered and untempered. Already, this project is serving its purpose and I am learning by doing. I am very excited to see what I will learn in the next year.