RECIPE

The best manner to store chocolate-covered strawberries, plus a recipe

PSA: Valentine's Twenty-four hours is most here!

Past Kelly Vaughan

Published Feb 12, 2022 five:59PM (EST)

(Carolina Gelen / Food52)

This story first appeared on Food52, an online community that gives you everything you lot need for a happier kitchen and domicile – that ways tested recipes, a shop full of beautiful products, a cooking hotline, and everything in between!

Somewhere along the way, Edible Arrangements got a bad rap. Is it impersonal? I suppose. But is an arrangement spiked with melon wedges, chocolate-dipped strawberries, and fresh pineapple formed in the shape of flowers delicious and delicious? Absolutely. Bootleg chocolate-covered strawberries are, however, both personaland succulent. Give me a dozen for Valentine's 24-hour interval, along with a diamond ring from Tiffany for each of my fingers like I've won the last 10 Super Bowls and I'll be a happy camper.

Food52's Recipes Resident Caroline Gelen already won Valentine's 24-hour interval with her technique for making Marbled Chocolate-Covered Strawberries. If y'all decide to brand these marble masterpieces too, a good technique is nothing without proper storage.And then what'south the best way to shop chocolate-covered strawberries? Before you practice anything (snacking on chocolate wafers included),stick a baking sheet in the freezer. The metal tray will get ice cold, which will allow the warm chocolate to quickly firm up as before long as you lot lay the dipped berries on acme of it. But permit's non go ahead of ourselves. One time the tray is in the freezer, you tin begin washing and prepping the strawberries and melting the dark and white chocolates. And with the magic of television . . . the prep work is washed! Fourth dimension to pull the tray from the freezer (wearable an oven mitt, then your fingers don't stick to the metallic).

Next, line the baking sheet with wax paper or parchment paper (wax paper has more of a nonstick surface, which is preferred, but parchment will do in a compression). Lay the dipped chocolate strawberries on top of the lined tray, leaving a little bit of room between each berry. Once the tray is filled, popular it in the fridge for about an 60 minutes to allow the chocolate to completely harden. As soon every bit the berries are set, wrap them with plastic wrap and leave the strawberries at room temperature for up to 24 hours, at which signal you can suit them in a bouquet for your sweetheart. (Or just swallow them yourself, I don't judge.)

How long exercise chocolate-covered strawberries concluding, anyway? If you program to go along them around for at to the lowest degree 48 hours, put them in the refrigerator, but practice and so with caution. The fridge volition create extra moisture, causing the berries to appear as if they are "sweating." Not beautiful. Once once again, I will plow to the undecayed Edible Arrangements for guidance as to how to navigate this new challenge: "You don't want to store the berries in an airtight container, because this will cause decomposition and mold at a much quicker rate than if the strawberries are lightly covered." Instead, East.A. (I take to give my shell a nickname, right?) recommends keeping the berries on the canvas tray but wrapping them with plastic wrap or aluminum foil, which will increase the airflow and prevent said condensation.

Better notwithstanding, place a canvass or two of paper towels dusted with baking soda at the lesser of the container, which will absorb even more excess moisture. Lay the wax or parchment paper on top, followed by berries, and so wrap the whole tray with plastic wrap. "When you refrigerate your chocolate-covered strawberries, they won't taste as fresh or flavorful as keeping them at room temperature. But, of course, you lot'll get more than longevity out of them," says Edible Arrangements on their website. A simple edible bouquet filled with chocolate-covered strawberries always has been, and always will exist, there for me and that's the greatest Valentine's Day gift of all. But I will take ten lilliputian blue boxes, also.

***

Recipe: Marbled Chocolate-Covered Strawberries

Ingredients

  • 1 pound large ripe strawberries, at room temperature
  • 6 ounces (170 grams) dark or semisweet chocolate, chopped (1 cup)
  • 1 teaspoon refined coconut oil (optional)
  • two ounces (56 grams) white chocolate, chopped (1/3 cup)

Directions

  1. Place a canvas pan in the freezer.
  2. Lay a clean kitchen towel on a work surface. Thoroughly wash the strawberries with room-temperature tap h2o, and so dump them onto the towel. Gently move them effectually to dry out. Now apply some other kitchen towel or paper towel to selection up each strawberry and brand sure there is no remaining h2o or moisture. Transfer the dried strawberries to a dry kitchen towel.
  3. Place roughly three-quarters of the chocolate in a mug or a tall, cylindrical dish. Melt for threescore to 75 seconds in the microwave, mixing at 30-second intervals. (You can also do this in a double banality.) Once melted, mix in the remaining chocolate and one teaspoon of coconut oil (if using). In a divide dish, melt the white chocolate using the same method (but no need for any oil here).
  4. Take the sail pan out of the freezer and line it with parchment paper.
  5. Dry each strawberry one last time. Drizzle a quarter of the melted white chocolate on top of the dark or semisweet chocolate, and so apply a skewer or chopstick to lightly swirl—not too much! Yous desire the colors to stay separate. Grab the strawberry by the leaves (or spear the stalk with a skewer or chopstick), and so elevate and roll it beyond the surface of the chocolate; this shallow horizontal dip yields a marbled pattern, versus a deep vertical dip, which blends the colors too much. Hold the strawberry over the mug and milkshake the excess chocolate off. Place the chocolate-covered strawberry on the lined canvas pan. Repeat until no white chocolate remains, then add more white chocolate and repeat. (If yous'd like, y'all tin drizzle any remaining chocolate over the strawberries.)
  6. Air-condition for at to the lowest degree twenty minutes or upward to 1 twenty-four hours earlier serving. If you're refrigerating for more than i hour, transfer to an closed container.

Kelly Vaughan

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