Here’s how to make our four favourite variations on classic chocolate bark. (RECIPES)
EASY & DELISH | We are forever on the lookout for spectacular made-in-minutes desserts. Our quest has lead us to ambrosial treats such as Donna Hey’s five-minute clafloutis, Dorie Greenspan’s five-minute apple cake and Teresa Syrnyk’s quick bacon candy. Every one these sweets is two yums up in our book—and so is chocolate bark, the perfect basket-ready candy to share at Easter.
Nothing is easier to make than chocolate bark is, and few desserts have the potential for personalizing that this drop-dead gorgeous confection has.
Here are our top four chocolate bark recipes.
Bark Management
Chocolate bark is basically melted chocolate that has been poured out into a pan and then garnished with candies, fruits, flowers, nuts, whatever. That’s all there is to it. You can use whatever type of chocolate you like and whatever toppings in whatever combinations you want, which is what can make each batch of bark so interesting.
Contrary to what some recipes say, it really is best to melt your chocolate on the stove, in a double boiler (not in the microwave). If you don’t have an official pan, improvise by using a stainless steel mixing bowl over a pot of boiling water.
I like to make bark in bread baking pans. They are the prefect size to turn out slabs of bark that look like supersize candy bars. Be sure to line the pan you use with greased parchment paper so the candy will pop out of it easily.
Barks Worth A Bite
We love Specialty Cake Creations’s white chocolate bark made with freeze-dried strawberries (find them at outdoor stores or Trader Joe’s) and salted pistachios. CLICK HERE for the recipe.
We love Murray Bancroft’s Nowruz-inspired chocolate bark. We made ours with rose petals (find them at Persian markets or specialty food shops), salted pistachios and dried sour cherries. CLICK HERE for the recipe.
We love Healthy-Delicious.com’s ginger coconut dark chocolate bark. CLICK HERE for the recipe.
We love Martha Stewart’s lime and macadamia nut bark. CLICK HERE for the recipe. — eds
A Dry Idea
/1 Comment/in BEAUTY, Beauty How-To, Hair & Nails, THE LATEST, View All Beauty Stories /by EditorHere is a shockingly simple way to ensure that your hair looks shiny and super smooth.
THIS REALLY WORKS | Had you told me that it would be this easy to get shiny salon-smooth hair without a professional blow out, doubting Thomasina that I am, there’s no way I would have believed you. But that was before I tried this one simple trick. Read more
Watch Out, Windex
/3 Comments/in Cleaning & Maintenance, HOME, THE LATEST, View All Home Stories /by EditorThis simple, chemical-free cleaning tool will leave your windows and mirrors with a shockingly non-streaky shine. (VIDEO)
SHOCK & AWE | We live in a house filled with reflective surfaces that we are currently sharing with our daughter, her husband and their very curious baby, Dylan.
Dylan loves to press herself up against the windows and to touch the small human who eyeballs her back every time she looks into a mirror. And wherever she goes, this sweet child leaves tiny paw prints behind.
Not that her baby smudges bother us much. They’re kind of endearing really, but add them to the bug splats and floss bits that accumulate routinely on what-are-meant-to-be-sparkling surfaces, and there’s always a mess to contend with. Read more
Dear Frugalbits readers,
It’s hard to believe that four years have passed since we first launched this little adventure in online publishing, but they have. And through all that time, while we were concentrating on content, magazine-style websites like ours were changing in the way they look and function.
They got wider, pictures got bigger, and “responsive” design, which looks great on any screen size, became the new normal. By last fall, once charming Frugalbits had begun to look more and more out of the loop; clearly it needed a makeover.
And this is precisely what we’ve gotten. Thanks to the talented team at Vanhit.com we have a wonderful new logo, a gorgeous new homepage, and a lovely minimalist design that is dead easy to navigate.
So please take a few minutes to test drive our new model, and then if you would, let us know what you think of it at editors@frugalbits.com.
—XO Team Frugalbits
Postcard image: via moo.com
Complexion Perfection: Make Superior Quality Vitamin C Serum At Home
/0 Comments/in Fashion & Beauty, SAVE MONEY, Skin & Body Care, View All Beauty Stories /by carolannruleVitamin C serum has proven benefits for the skin—and it’s dead simple to make fresh at home. (RECIPE)
CHEAP + SUPERIOR | It’s not often that an inexpensive homemade skincare treatment is considered to be the gold standard and not a less-desirable less-effective alternative to commercial product lines. But make-it-yourself-in-a-minute vitamin C serum is equal if not superior to most moderately priced vitamin C serums, and no doubt outperforms plenty of the incredibly expensive ones, too. Read more
The Next Best Thing To Having A Live-In Hair Stylist
/0 Comments/in BEAUTY, Fashion & Beauty, Hair & Nails, HOW-TO KNOW-HOW, SAVE TIME, View All Beauty Stories, View All How-To Stories /by EditorThe BaByliss Big Hair Rotating Air Styler will give your hair Victoria Beckham-quality volume and shine in record time.
MONEY WELL SPENT | I have a lot of hair. This is both a blessing and a curse. While I’m grateful that in all probability I’ll never go bald, my abundant mane is a royal pain when it comes to styling it myself. Not only does my mop take a discouragingly long time to blow dry, but the results never look polished because I can’t really work a round brush and dryer in tandem. Read more
Appetite For Easy: One Minute Guacamole
/0 Comments/in Easy + Quick = Delicious, Entertaining, FOOD, Food & Drink, SAVE TIME, View All Food Stories /by EditorHere’s a recipe for the best guacamole you’ll ever scoop on a chip: it’s fresh, seriously delicious and you can make it in a minute.
ONE-MINUTE WONDER | It’s a holiday today in British Columbia and we are having friends over for a dinner, which means I’m going to need appies: lots of them. I can get away with serving strictly store-bought stuff—cerignola olives, edemame in the shell, gourmet potato chips—if I serve it in small, one-of-a-kind containers that give it an air of exclusivity. But store-bought alone feels ungracious to me so I like to mix in a few homemade or half-scratch appies I can turn around on a dime. One of my all-time half-scratch favourites is cheater guacamole. I’m always surprised by how many people ask me for the recipe. Read more
Why You Want To Work In 20-Minute Spurts
/0 Comments/in Culture & Leisure, HOW-TO KNOW-HOW, SAVE EFFORT, SAVE ENERGY, View All How-To Stories /by EditorEverything in your daily life—be it a physical or mental activity—can be vastly improved by working in 20-minute spurts.
WORK SMARTER | While there is proven science behind the idea that just 20 minutes of the right kind of daily physical activity leads to a longer, healthier life (read Gretchen Reynolds’s The First 20 Minutes, or an article on the book in the NYT), there’s no specific science I know of linking 20-minute chunks of mental focus to greater effectiveness at work. And yet I’m living proof that this is the case. Read more
BARKING MAD
/2 Comments/in BUY THIS. MAKE THAT., FOOD, Food & Drink, View All Food Stories /by EditorHere’s how to make our four favourite variations on classic chocolate bark. (RECIPES)
EASY & DELISH | We are forever on the lookout for spectacular made-in-minutes desserts. Our quest has lead us to ambrosial treats such as Donna Hey’s five-minute clafloutis, Dorie Greenspan’s five-minute apple cake and Teresa Syrnyk’s quick bacon candy. Every one these sweets is two yums up in our book—and so is chocolate bark, the perfect basket-ready candy to share at Easter.
Nothing is easier to make than chocolate bark is, and few desserts have the potential for personalizing that this drop-dead gorgeous confection has.
Here are our top four chocolate bark recipes.
Bark Management
Chocolate bark is basically melted chocolate that has been poured out into a pan and then garnished with candies, fruits, flowers, nuts, whatever. That’s all there is to it. You can use whatever type of chocolate you like and whatever toppings in whatever combinations you want, which is what can make each batch of bark so interesting.
Contrary to what some recipes say, it really is best to melt your chocolate on the stove, in a double boiler (not in the microwave). If you don’t have an official pan, improvise by using a stainless steel mixing bowl over a pot of boiling water.
I like to make bark in bread baking pans. They are the prefect size to turn out slabs of bark that look like supersize candy bars. Be sure to line the pan you use with greased parchment paper so the candy will pop out of it easily.
Barks Worth A Bite
We love Specialty Cake Creations’s white chocolate bark made with freeze-dried strawberries (find them at outdoor stores or Trader Joe’s) and salted pistachios. CLICK HERE for the recipe.
We love Murray Bancroft’s Nowruz-inspired chocolate bark. We made ours with rose petals (find them at Persian markets or specialty food shops), salted pistachios and dried sour cherries. CLICK HERE for the recipe.
We love Healthy-Delicious.com’s ginger coconut dark chocolate bark. CLICK HERE for the recipe.
We love Martha Stewart’s lime and macadamia nut bark. CLICK HERE for the recipe. — eds
Got An Hour? Knit A Loopy Mango Scarf!
/0 Comments/in Classics & Trends, FASHION, Fashion & Beauty, SAVE TIME, View All Fashion Stories /by EditorSuper chunky yarn + giant knitting needles = the coolest handmade neck warmers on the planet
EASY & QUICK | Got and hour? Why not make yourself (or someone you love) an arresting hand-knit cowl with gargantuan yarn from Loopy Mango. Clueless when it comes to knitting? No worries. Loopy Mango’s merino wool kits for infinity and super long scarves come complete with monster-loop yarn, giant birch wood knitting needles and instructions so explicit rank beginners will be churning out neck-wraps in no time.
Read more
GOING CLEAR
/3 Comments/in BUY THIS. MAKE THAT., Chic & Easy Projects, DECOR & DESIGN, DIY, Goods & Services, HOME, HOW-TO KNOW-HOW, View All DIY Stories, View All Home Stories, View All How-To Stories /by EditorThis DIY acrylic barrier will stop canine escape artists without stopping the eye.
DO IT YOURSELF | We love our Scottie-pug dog child, Dudley (pictured here), but he does have one annoying, potentially life-threatening habit. When we accidentally leave an outside door open, he bolts. While this is never a good thing, it is particularly troublesome at my husband’s garden design office where Dudley earns his kibble working as a greeter.
To foil this behaviour, senior landscape designer Kim Stuart came up with an inexpensive all-but-invisible system that eliminates the need to install those supremely unattractive but highly effective baby (a.k.a. dog) gates. Read more