Welcome to the last day of our epic baking week! In my most humble opinion, I think we saved the best for last–homemade peppermint patties. When I found this recipe and posted it on one Sunday’s Recipes Around the Web, I just knew I had to add it to my Christmas baking list.The peppermint patties were so easy and fun to make, although I did have to turn a blind eye to the ingredients–6 cups of powdered sugar!
You start by forming a dough out of sweetened condensed milk, peppermint extract, and powdered sugar. I highly recommend doing this in an electric mixer because the dough gets really stiff. Next, you knead the dough until it becomes even more stiff, snf then roll it out to 1/4 inch thick on a surface coated with powdered sugar.
Next, the recipe says to cut the dough into approximately 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 inch circles. I didn’t have a round cookie cutter, so I searched all over the house till I found something that would work–my salad dressing jar! Our circles were more like 1/2 or 3/4 of an inch thick, so we ended up with about 32 peppermint patties.
Place the peppermint patties on parchment paper to dry. They need to dry for 2 hours on each side in order to set up before you dip them in the chocolate.
When the patties are dry, heat the chocolate and shortening in a double boiler on the stove. We just used a large glass boil on top of our sauce pan. This helps maintain the temperature of the chocolate and prevents it from burning.
Next, place a few peppermint patties into the chocolate mixture and coat completely with the chocolate. When coated, remove and place on parchment paper.
You’ll need to let the chocolate harden for about 12 hours before serving.
If you can resist eating them all, the peppermint patties make great gifts–there just might be a few lucky people under my Christmas tree!
Peppermint Patties
Makes 24
Adapted from http://www.food.com/recipe/peppermint-patties-101027
Ingredients:
- 14 ounces sweetened condensed milk
- 1 tablespoon peppermint extract
- 6 cups powdered sugar
- 24 -32 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 4 -6 tablespoons shortening
Steps:
- Combine the sweetened condensed milk and peppermint extract in an electric mixer.
- Slowly add the powdered sugar and beat.
- Knead on a surface sprinkled with more sugar until dough is stiff. (The stiffer the better when it come to the dipping part!) Add more sugar while kneading if the dough is sticky.
- Roll 1/4 inch thick.
- Cut into approximately 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 inch circles. If they are much bigger than that they fall apart when you dip them.
- Let the cut patties dry for at least 2 hours on *each* side. They need to be really dry.
- Melt chocolate & shortening it a double boiler; stirring constantly until smooth, using 1 Tbls of shortening for every 6 oz. of chocolate. Keep chocolate hot for dipping.
- Dip patties in melted chocolate. Remove and place on parchment paper and let harden for about 12 hours.