Chocolate Embelishment for Cookies

I dunno.  It's not frosting.  It's not ganache.  It's just good old melted chocolate, sort of tempered so that it doesn't take a hundred years to harden and piped or dunked on a cookie.  What would you call it, then?  Chocolate Emblishment, it is then.  Oh, oh, oh, I know....enrobed.  Chocolate Enrobed Cookies.  Meh,  I already typed Emblishment up there, it's all good.  And, I mean it.  It's all good.

See how pretty they are, and just perfect for giving out at Christmas.  The chocolate is firm, so you don't have to worry about the cookies making a giant mess.  And it's just so yummy and fun!  You get to be creative and make pretty designs and...

Ugggh.  Fail.  Okay, so don't be like me and do this with your chocolate.  That's not exactly the goal.  I was using a plastic baggy, filled with chocolate with a snip cut out of the corner.  I had made a very petite snip though and as a result, busted out the bag.  Try, try again.  And eat the cookies that were sacrificed for this viewing audience.

Step 1.  Make this cookie  You will not regret it.

Step 2.  Assemble the ingredients you need.  That would be chocolate chips and a bit of vegetable shortening.  I would say I had about 1 cup of chocolate chips.  I used both semi sweet and milk chocolate, actually they were what were left in the bags after I made These Cookies!  And 1 to 2 tsp Veg. Shortening.

Step 3.  Separate the chocolate chips.  Put 3/4 of the chips in one bowl and 1/4 of the chips in another.   Give or take.  Maybe even less than 1/4.

Step 4. To the larger bowl of chips add 1 to 2 tsp. vegetable shortening.

Step 5.  Microwave on full strength for 30 seconds the larger bowl of chips.  Stir.  Microwave for 30 more seconds.  Stir.  You do not want to burn your chocolate, but you also don't want it not melted.  You want it to be just melted.  So after 1 minute, be cautious.  You will have to probably zap it again, but go in much smaller increments, like 10 seconds a time.  Once you have nicely liquid chocolate...

Step 6.  Add the un-melted chips to the melted chips.  Stir until everything is melted.  Voila!  You have sort of tempered chocolate.  Tempered chocolate is super more complicated than this, it involves thermometers and seed chocolate and...I'll get into it another time.  But, this'll get the job done for you.

Step 7.  Spoon chocolate into a baggy, cut a bit off one corner and get all artistic with your bad self.  Do not make the hole too small.  Or face the consequences.  And they are dire indeed.  Too big though, and you might not get the look you're going for.  You can also dunk part of the cookie in the chocolate that spilled.  I like to decorate my cookies while they're sitting on a piece of parchment, it keeps the chocolate from getting everywhere.  You can also take a spoon, dip the tip in the chocolate and swing it back and forth to make your cookies look oh so elegant! 

Step 8.  Let chocolate firm up.  I cannot give you an exact amount of time, as I was gone for about an hour after I had piped and enrobed my cookies with chocolate.  So, somewhere within an hour, they should be nice and solid.

Enjoy your beautiful embelished and enrobed cookies.

Merry Christmas!

Heather