Potato Chocolate Covered Cherries

I’m not going to lie to you. Making these is a labor of love. However, it’s labor that can be divided up over a few days. This is another recipe from my mother-in-law. The original version is first, followed by the changes I made.

Filling:

1/3 c. mashed potatoes

1 ¾ c. powdered sugar

1 ½ c. coconut

½ tsp. vanilla

I added a ½ c. dried cherries and ¼ c. Amaretto and omitted the vanilla. The cherries were soaked in the Amaretto overnight before I did anything else. After soaking they were mashed, then added to the other filling ingredients. The consistency should be like cookie dough. Instant mashed potato flakes can be used in place of homemade. They can also be added if the filling has too much liquid. I used standard flaked coconut, but next time I will either run it through the food processor or use macaroon coconut (like this product, http://www.bobsredmill.com/fine-macaroon-coconut.html?&cat=). The filling can be covered and put in the refrigerator until you are ready for the next step.

Place parchment or wax paper on two half-size, rimmed baking sheets. Rather than forming a ball in my hand, I found it easiest to put 1 tbsp. heaps of the filling on a sheet. A maraschino cherry, with stem, was pushed into each heap, than the filling was formed around each cherry. If the filling gets too soft from handling, let it chill in the refrigerator before dipping in chocolate.

Coating:

1 c. semi-sweet chocolate chips

¼ - ½ bar paraffin

Instead of using paraffin, I made chocolate ganache. (An example here: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/chocolate-ganache-recipe/index.html). After the cherries are dipped in the chocolate, place on the second sheet and refrigerate. The cherry stems provide a handle for dipping. In the event that you don’t have cherries with stems, or the filling wants to stay behind in the chocolate, there is an alternate method for enrobing. Put the chocolate in a condiment bottle. Squeeze a circle about the size of a quarter or a little larger, place a cherry in the middle, and use the bottle to drizzle chocolate over it until coated.

I can’t say how many cherries were yielded. I didn’t count, but my guess is close to 2 dozen. I just kept placing heaps of filling on the sheet until it was gone. If I ran out of ganache, half batches were made until all the cherries were coated.

I know making your own chocolate covered cherries sounds like a lot of work, but they are worlds better than store-bought. They are also a great intro into candy making because there is no need for cooking sugar or a candy thermometer. Just take your time and have fun.

The Project Queen