Peppermint Bark

By tlshinnick

Ingredients

• 12 oz. of high-quality white chocolate chips or dark chocolate chips
• 5 regular sized candy canes, crushed up
• 1/2 teaspoon of peppermint extract

Details

Servings 1
Preparation time 5mins
Cooking time 25mins
Adapted from simplyrecipes.com

Preparation

Step 1

Break up peppermint candy into little pieces. Melt the chocolate according to the manufacturer's instructions. Once melted, add the peppermint extract and stir.

Pour the melted chocolate out onto a cookie sheet lined with wax paper and spread out with a spatula or wooden spoon. Sprinkle the peppermint candy chunks on to the chocolate and gently press them in with yours hands.

Place in the freezer for 5 minutes or until hardened. Break into pieces and serve or store in the fridge in an airtight container.

dark chocolate to use in chocolate cookies, but I think the idea of adding to cupcakes might be even better! Yours looks delicious.

Guittard, Valrhona, Callebaut, and Scharffen Berger are fine examples of quality chocolate (Nestle will work great if it’s all you have). Plus most offer various cacao percentages so you can make the flavor as dark and bitter as you prefer it. ~Garrett

Glad to see this recipe…while holiday shopping I could not believe what some specialty stores were charging for their peppermint bark! I would like to attempt a layer of white chocolate on top of the dark vs. one or the other. Any tips on how I can keep the layers from mixing when I prepare the bark? Thanks!

Follow the recipe as above. Once the candy is in place and the chocolate hardened, pour the next layer of chocolate over it. Don’t try to do both chocolates melted at the same time (unless you want a marbled effect). ~Garrett

My druthers calls for using a nice dark chocolate (60 – 70%) to make this, however.

Great timing! I made bark today and plan to make some of the peppermint variety this week (after I found candy canes with no corn syrup in them yesterday!). I went a bit exotic with the ones I made today; one kind is dark chocolate mixed with garam masala, curry powder, and a touch of ground salt, topped with toasted coconut; and the other is dark chocolate mixed with chopped (dried) guajillo peppers, cinnamon, and orange peel, and topped with pink salt chunks and toasted almonds. This is my first holiday season since going gluten-free and allergen-free (casein-free, egg-free, soy-free), and it’s fun to have naturally gluten-/allergen-free holiday treats to spice up.

I have been making this since I was a little girl in the 70′s. I thought I was being so clever when I discovered adding a bit of peppermint extract all those years ago! Hmmm!

I have a question — when I buy the chocolate in the store, it is not refrigerated, nor are the candy canes. What is it about melting it, then adding extract & candy that makes it need to be refrigerated afterwards? The reason being that I plan on making cookie trays/boxes as gifts with at least 6 or 7 different types of cookies/candy in them, including this, and want to avoid things that need to be refrigerated for storage reasons, since it will be nearly impossible for me to make everything all at once.

A Word of Caution… When you put the peppermint extract into the chocolate, do it with the gas flame off. I just had a friend’s daughter get burned yesterday because while she was adding the extract, some of it spilled onto the gas burner and ignited. This stuff is 86% alcohol and as cooks, we all know what that can do. I would change the recipe to make sure that you do that step either off of the stove, or with the burner off.

I made this this weekend and made the mistake of turning off the burner before I was ready to spread in the pan. I used a double boiler and was still (over) concerned about burning the white chocolate, and I turned down the heat before adding the extract and getting help with pouring. The chocolate immediately started to harden, and wouldn’t spread. I made it anyway, but it’s super lumpy, and not really “bark.” Still good, but I’ll probably have to take a rolling pin to the finished product before it’s ready for consumption…

I once found a tip for easier crushing of the candycanes is to place them in the freezer for about 2 hours before you need to crush them – I find this helps to make a finer crush, rather than a chunkier one, if not frozen beforehand.

Also, I’ve always made this recipe without the peppermint extract but I just tried it this weekend with the extract and as soon as I added it to the melted chocolate it siezed up into a mushy/lumpy mess (I used expensive Callebeau chocolate too!). Nothing I did helped fix it so I ended up rolling it into a bunch of little chocolate balls and dusted them with cocoa powder… but any tips to help stop the seizing up?

Hmm… is your extract at room temperature? I’ve never had a problem with the chocolate siezing up . Just be sure the chocolate is still quite warm, if not hot, when you add the extract. ~Garrett

To get the candy canes crushed but not powdered, try putting the canes into a freezer bag and then hitting them with a heavy china or pottery mug. You can use the bottom edge of the mug to target larger pieces. Once the pieces are small enough, pour them into another plastic bag so that you can sprinkle them over the melted chocolate.

I used a double boiler to melt Trader Joe’s dark chocolate chips, a heaping half teaspoon of peppermint extract, and “release” tin foil on the cookie sheet.

With small, pretty evenly sized candy pieces, this makes a really good bark.

Everyone loved this its easy to make and light tasting, I made it with white chocolate and added lots of crushed candy canes it was a big hit and now it will be on my Christmas baking list for years to come. Thanks.

After years of giving my sister chocolate for her birthday and never receiving a comment, I received accolades this year when I sent her a few pieces of this Peppermint bark. My children (ages 13, 7, 4, 1) all had jobs (like opening the candy canes and beating them with in a bag with a rolling pin). I was short on extract so I added 3 drops of peppermint essential oil along with a 1/2 teaspoon of extract. I used the Ghiradelli 70% bittersweet oversized chips to melt for the chocolate with success.

My question is about tempering… a few days after making the bark (Belgian dark chocolate) it was spotty, though tasted fine of course. I also made it with white chocolate, and that batch looked fine as I would have predicted. Anything I can do to keep it looking great a few days after making it? I’d like to give some away next holiday season, and want it to keep beyond the first couple days I make it. Thanks!

I plan to make this as a gift to mail out to family and I was wondering if it’s necessary to temper both the white and the dark chocolate if I plan to layer them? Also, is dark chocolate best for layering or will semi-sweet or any other chocolate be a better fit? Thanks for your help. Love your site!!!!

Because the dark chocolate in this recipe is not tempered, it will get “spotty” after a few days. It’s still good to eat, it just doesn’t look good. If you want to make the dark chocolate peppermint bark for gifts, you will want to temper the chocolate first. David Lebovitz has some advice regarding

but once i added the Peppermint Extract the white chocolate solidified!

Make sure the extract is warm and not cold, otherwise yes, it will freeze it up. Furthermore, you have to act quickly in this recipe. Add it, stir it, then spread it out flat. ~Garrett

2) Melt your chocolate in a glass bowl in the microwave on medium or low heat depending on the strength of your microwave. Stop melting as soon as the chocolate starts to look soft (don’t wait for it to get entirely melted into a pool). The test of whether it is melted is whether it yields entirely to touch.

3) Add room-temperature peppermint extract and stir in well with rubber spatula. If your ratios are good and you used Nestle this SHOULD NOT ruin your texture.

4) Spread over large cookie sheets lined with freezer paper (this worked great and did not stick at all). Spread thinner if you plan to do a double layer. Add crushed soft peppermint in variety of sizes to produce varied texture. Freeze completely.

5) Remove from freezer and if desired add a second layer of chocolate over the first layer (I used chocolate and vanilla). This will produce a much thicker and robust bark than the single-layer variety.

I tried the recipe today, and like another commenter (above), my chocolate seized up into one big clumpy, expensive mess. My peppermint extract was at room temp. It could be variations in the extract contents – I didn’t notice at the time, but mine has water in its list of ingredients, so of course it seized up. In the future, I will use Peppermint Oil instead.

When I was researching how to make my homemade chocolates they mentioned if adding food coloring drops (which have water content) that it is really important to add it one drop at a time and mix well before adding more to prevent the chocolate from seizing up. I followed their advice and had no issues. I assume this same method would apply to those having problems with their chocolate seizing up when adding their extract. I don’t have peppermint extract so am going to try it with a little peppermint shnapps instead. Fingers crossed. :)

I made a similar recipe last year, but layered dark chocolate- let it harden in freezer, then put a layer of white chocolate on top. When I went to break it up, the layers separated- any idea why? It still tasted great though (just didn’t make a pretty gift).

Dark chocolate worked well when mixing in the peppermint extract, as mentioned by others, you just have to be quick with it and stirring it in while it is hot!

I layered white chocolate on top, but found that when I tried adding the extract, it DID seize up and get crumbly. I added a little bit of oil to it and had to mix it quite a bit until it became workable again (Putting it into the microwave for 20 second intervals if needed). The second batch I did not add the extract to, just did plain white chocolate on top and this worked much better. Didn’t really lose any of the peppermint taste!

PS I tried to make this also with Carob chips (as I personally can’t eat anything with Dairy), and this definitely did NOT work. First experience with Carob chips, and they do not melt well!!

I used a bag of semisweet chocolate chips and melted them over low heat. I then poured it onto wax paper and placed it in the fridge for 30 minutes. I then melted some white chocolate and added some crushed peppermint candy to it. I then poured that onto the semisweet chocolate and let it all set. Yummy!

Hi I was wondering if I make a few weeks ahead of time but keep refridgerated will that help the chocolate from looking dull since tempering is not called for in this receipe. Thank you.