Chocolate dipping

[magid]

I bought a 4.5-pound bar of dark chocolate at Trader Joe's last week. My plan was to make a lot of vegan truffles. Unfortunately, Paper and Provisions didn't have any marzipan. Next week, they said. In the meantime, I wanted to try out the chocolate. I'd read that someone had had a difficult time breaking the bar into usable pieces. Luckily, I didn't have that problem (though perhaps, "usable size" was different for me; I only had to fit the piece(s) into a bain-marie, not make shavings or anything). I put the bar hanging over the end of the table, and a few whacks of a hand made a break this way, then that. So, last night I was able to make as much chocolate-covered ginger as I had ginger (ie I should've stocked up with more), and a bunch of almond clusters as well. I'm thinking of making some (dairy) truffles next, perhaps using more of the egg nog I have hanging around. Not so sure about this, but worth the experiment, I think. And once I get some almond paste, another batch of vegan truffles as well. Perhaps I won't have tons of chcolate hanging around too long...