Making Chocolate at Home

Thank you to Glee Gum for sending me a free Make Your Own Chocolate Kit for the purpose of this review.

When I thought of Glee Gum, I always thought of gum.  I had seen it in the store before but never really gave it a thought.  Then, I was asked to review a candy-making kit.  We love hands-on activities, and a hands-on activity making candy AND learning at the same time is right up our alley.  Unfortunately, moving delayed our trying out the kit, but the wait made it all the more exciting.

Glee Gum sells kits to make gum, gummy candy, and chocolate ($13.95 each).  Knowing how much the kids like chocolate, I chose the Make Your Own Chocolate Kit.  Everything that I needed was in the box except for a glass bowl (or double broiler), a wooden spoon, and optional add ins.  Make sure to read all of the directions before starting because there is a step that is only 10 seconds long, so it is good to know what happens after that.

We started by putting the cocoa butter in a bowl to melt in the microwave.  I didn’t realize it would be a hard block, but I guess I had never really thought about it before.

After we took the melted cocoa butter out of the microwave, we took turns leaning over the bowl and inhaling the yummy aroma.  We could have stood there all day just smelling it, but we kept going with the instructions.

Next, we added the contents of a couple more envelopes and mixed vigorously.  Now, it looked like chocolate.

This is where we ran into problems.  After microwaving, we were supposed to add one more ingredient, but the temperature strip didn’t ever show the target temperature.  We waited, mixed, and watched for quite some time.  According to the directions, it could be as long as 15 minutes.  After that length of time, I tried it, and it was fairly cool.  I added the last ingredient, mixed, and spooned into the paper cups.

After sitting in the refrigerator for a while, we had some chocolate.  This is not milk chocolate, but I didn’t find it as sharp as dark chocolate.  It didn’t set up exactly right, I don’t think, and that may have been due to the last step mentioned above.  It was still good, though.

The cool thing about this is that the Glee Gum website has a page with the history of chocolate and a lesson to do in conjunction with making the chocolate.  What’s better than schoolwork and chocolate at once?

Who would like to win a kit of your own?  Glee Gum is going to give one lucky winner ONE candy making kit, winner’s choice!  Just read the directions below and enter on the Rafflecopter widget.

Rules: Giveaway starts at 12:45 am EDT on June 14, 2013 and ends at 12:00 am EDT on June 29, 2013. Open to U.S. residents 18 years old and older. Shipping to the Continental U.S. only.  No purchase is necessary to win. Void where prohibited. Odds of winning depend on the number of entries collected. The winner will be chosen by Random.org via Rafflecopter and will have 48 hours to respond after being contacted by email.  Please make sure to use a valid email address. Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Google+ do not endorse this, nor sponsor this giveaway. Nor are Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or Google+ affiliated with this giveaway in any way. This Roller Coaster Called Life is not responsible for prize fulfillment.  Additional rules here.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure:  I received the above mentioned kit free for the purpose of this review.  I received no other compensation, nor was I required to give a positive review.  All opinions are 100% mine.