Homemade Marshmallows with Hot Chocolate

On Saturday, as part of Nick’s birthday, we decided to make marshmallows.  He had been watching Good Eats with Alton Brown on the Food Network this week.  He watched the marshmallow episode 4 times and really wanted to make them.  On Friday, we went off to the store to buy the needed ingredients such as sugar and gelatine.  He loved carrying the recipe around the store and helping gather the ingredients.  I had heard lots of things about making them.  Some people said it was easy, while others said that I should prepare Nick in case they don’t turn out.

Stephen joined in the fun to help make them.  He and Nick worked on measuring the ingredients.

Nick and Sally double checked the recipe.  The recipe is really simple.  In a mixing bowl, gelatine and cold water soaks, while a sugar mixture cooks.  I loved that the mixture needed to cook, but we didn’t need to stir constantly.  We were going for 240 degrees.

After the mixture cooked, we added it to the gelatine mixture.  Then, the mixer needed to beat on high for 13 minutes.  It was loud and the stand mixer definitely got a workout.

We were quite excited to see marshmallow fluff in the making!  The last step was to add the vanilla.  The mixer goes crazy during that step.

Then, we spread it in the pan with the help of oiled gloves and an oiled spatula.  The gloves were GREAT!

Sunday morning, we turned them onto a cutting board and with a little cutting, our individual marshmallows were born.

I don’t see us ever putting the mixture into a piping bag for making marshmallow bunnies, but we’d definitely make this recipe again.  They were so creamy and delicious.

We took them to Nick’s family party on Sunday and served them with our version of Alton Brown’s  homemade hot chocolate.  We did make a couple of changes to his recipe.  We only had 1/2 cup of Dutch Process High Fat Cocoa and used it along with 1/2 cup of Natural High Fat Cocoa.  Both of these were from Penzeys.  We omitted the cayenne pepper, but added a teaspoon of cinnamon.  Our powdered milk was non fat.  We combined all of the ingredients in the food processor to help the mix have an even texture.  It worked great.

This was the best hot cocoa and marshmallows that I’ve ever had.  Nick can’t wait to make them roasting!  I guess we’ll be having a fire this summer.