Peppermint Bark

So this is a super easy recipe that you can experiment with and it makes a great holiday gift for co-workers or for those that didn't "make it" on your actual shopping list. I experimented and made 4 different types of bark.

Ingredients:

• 18 oz (which makes about 1 cookie sheet) of chocolate (milk, white, bittersweet, or dark)
• Peppermint candy (I used about 22 candy canes for 4 trays of bark)
• Peppermint oil

Directions:

1. Use a double boiler to melt down chocolate
2. Add peppermint oil to taste
   
3. Line a cookie sheet with borders (or any baking pan will do) with wax paper
   
4. Use a food processor to pulse peppermint (if you don't have a food processor, you can put the peppermint in a ziplock bag and use a rolling pin to crush candy)
   
5. Pour chocolate onto wax paper and sprinkle crushed peppermint over chocolate (you can also put the peppermint on the bottom of the pan but it will be "eaten up" by the chocolate and you won't be able to see it well)
6. place in fridge to chill (about 10 minutes)
7. Remove from pan and separate from wax paper. Break bark into pieces (any size you want) and you can place in cookie tins, use cellophane wrapping, or any other way you want.
   

Note: I made a milk chocolate bark, a raspberry milk chocolate bark, a dark chocolate orange bark, and a dark chocolate raspberry bark. I added raspberry truffle cocoa powder (about 1.5 teaspoons) to get the raspberry flavor. I added orange juice to get the orange flavor, but it made the bark too thick and lacked enough orange flavor. I would probably try grating orange zest to get more of a citrus flavor. I also melted down white chocolate, added peppermint oil to it, and drizzled it over some of the bark. You can really be creative and use any flavors you want and just experiment. Be creative and enjoy!