National Chocolate Week {Chocolate Popcorn}

Hello!  It's National Chocolate Week!  I know, every week is really chocolate week [for me anyway], but as soon as I realised there was a national celebration of it, and I started this blog to start documenting the things I make, I picked my favourite uses of the stuff and made them all and have them to share with the Internet this week.  If you have any amazing chocolate recipes you can share with me, please, please do - I'd love to try them!  So, to start........Popcorn:

I love popcorn.  Really love it.  Put a bowl of it in front of me and I can eat the lot before the film starts...and I resent having to share it - I want the whole bag for myself thanks.  I'm a salted butter fan, but popcorn has been making its way in the supermarkets as a luxury snack with brands such as Heston Bloomingcantspellit, Love Da Popcorn and Tyrrells all offering amazing flavours you would never have thought of associating with it.  As I'm not quite as adventurous and it is Chocolate Week, I've a few simple ideas for dressing up your own popcorn to keep you company next time you watch a film.

What I Used:
Plain Popcorn Packet / Popping Corn Maize
Decoration:
Milk/White Chocolate
Chopped Nuts
Caramel Sugar
Chocolate Drops/Sprinkles

Before I start I have a confession.  I went to make my popcorn using corn kernels and found I had used them all up, so I used a bag of microwave popcorn [and we only had salted - the shame].  Usually I would make plain popcorn when adding my own toppings, but I had to admit, I preferred it this way.

Pop your corn and lay on trays/kitchen top lined with greaseproof paper

Whilst it cools, melt your chocolate [I used plain and white, 50g each].  Bring a small pan of water to simmer and placing a glass bowl on top, then break your chocolate into pieces and add to the bowl, stir gently and just before it completely melts, remove the heat and continue stirring [alternatively, add the broken up chocolate to a microwavable bowl and melt in 10 second bursts, stirring each break until melted [I'm too scared in will burn in anything over, so varying the time according to your microwave].

 

 

Now the fun part - using a spoon, I drizzled the milk chocolate over half of the popcorn, along in lines to get an even coating.  Before drying, I used my hands to turn them over, drizzled more chocolate on the other side and then I sprinkled with chopped nuts

 

On the other half, I drizzled with [my favourite topping] white chocolate and caramel sugar

To hold in place, I also added an extra layer of chocolate on top.....because why not?

If you are covering all your popcorn with just one topping, you can just bung all the popcorn in a large bowl.  Drizzle the chocolate on top in sections, stirring [or get your hands in there] to get an even coating before it all dries, adding some more and repeating until you have it all as covered as you want.

Allow to dry before transferring in to your bowl, if you have managed not to eat it all along the way somehow [this is not me].

If you are serving the popcorn at a party or as favours, they also look great served in their variations in separate bowls, or in little cupcake cases [transfer them into the cases before cool and they will hold together].  Here I used white chocolate and dark choc flakes and plain chocolate with white choc drops:

I'm going to give a few other flavours a try over the next few weeks/couple of months - I watch an unhealthy number of films, especially during December, so I might update this post with my attempts at other flavours like caramel and simple butter, salt and sweet.  But I fear I may just find it easier/cheaper/tastier to buy them ready made - let me know if you make your own popcorn and how you flavour it - or if you make any chocolate popcorn and how it goes.

Don't forget to stop by tomorrow and see how I make my completely unhealthy but gorgeous hot chocolate [which you may as well enjoy with the popcorn chocfest]