A great DIY favor, that is sweet and savory, are candy coated pretzel sticks/rods. These are so delicious, they have the crunch of the pretzel, the savor from the salt, and the yummy goodness from the melted candy or chocolate. What makes them cute are the touches of candied sprinkles or edible glitter, and adding colorful ribbon to tie the treats together!
These treats are perfect for wedding or shower favors, they are easy to put together, and are easy to make an elegant and fun splash to your event.
Here's what you need, tweak where desired depending upon number of guests.
1 bag of pretzel rods
1/2 lb bag of Wilton candy melts (vanilla or chocolate)
Wilton nonpareil sprinkles-edible glitter-cupcake sprinkles, etc.
parchment paper
cookie sheet/jelly roll pan
pretzel rod treat bags and ties
curling ribbon or personalized ribbon
Optional:
candy coloring
vegetable oil
First thing, place some parchment paper onto a hard surface, such as a cookie sheet. Using the cookie sheet will enable you to place the pretzels into the freezer/fridge to aid in the hardening of the melted candy. Plus, the sheet will be helpful when sprinkling the sticks, letting the sprinkles fall where they may on the sheet, and not all over your table or counter.
Next, start by melting the chocolate. You can do this simply by boiling water in a pan. Once water is boiling, sit a sturdy glass bowl over the pan, (be sure water does not touch the bowl!), add in the candy/chocolate wafers, and stir with whisk until melted and smooth. If you want to color your candy, now is when to delicately add in a few drops of food coloring-a little bit goes a long way, start with small drops and gradually add one by one until your desired color.
If chocolate isn't smooth and somewhat thin, it is OK to add vegetable oil a little bit at a time, it helps to thin out the possible thick chocolate, and does not interfere with the flavor. Adding the oil also leaves a nice sheen, and doesn't taste oily, unless you add too much, so be cautious in adding small amounts at a time till desired consistency. You don't want it super runny, but you don't want a thick goopy mess. You want enough to coat the pretzel, where you can't see the pretzel through the melted candy layer.
What I did, as my bowl wasn't deep, and the pretzel rods were a bit long, I spooned the melted candy over the pretzels, completely and evenly covered the stick, leaving about 1-2 inches at the base of the stick for the guests to hold onto free of melted candy/chocolate. Tap the stick gently on the edge of the bowl to shake off any access candy/chocolate to drip back into the bowl.
Then, before placing the sticks onto the parchment lined cookie sheets, I sprinkled the sticks with nonpareils, evenly covering the melted candy. Roll the stick in your finger tips, so evenly cover the stick. Once evenly coated with sprinkles, place onto the cookie sheet. The best part about the parchment paper, the sticks should not stick to the paper, and you might have a flat surface on one side, but when candy has hardened, sticks should easily separate from the paper with no pulling.
Repeat, and place the pretzel sticks next to each other, but leave a bit of room so each candy covered pretzel breathes, and hardens individually. To speed up the process of hardening candy, I placed the cookie sheet(s) into the fridge.
When I pulled the sheets out of the fridge, I pulled the pretzels up off the parchment, and if any melted candy had spread, like angel wings, it was easy to tap away any access hardened chocolate wings with my finger tips, which then revealed a perfect candy coated pretzel stick.
Last phase is to grab your pretzel favor bags, turn them upside down, take your candy coated pretzel stick and drop into bag, leaving exposed side up, at the opening of the bag. At this point, pinch the bag where the pretzel ends, and tie with favor tie. If you plan to attach ribbon, lightly tie the ties, as they help to bind the bag together, so that when you tie the ribbon over the ties, you can simply remove them once the bags are secure with your ribbon. I mention this, as this is great if you don't have extra hands. Tying the bags with favor ties can be done with ease, but tying ribbons can be difficult if tying without a support, so this little trick alleviates the fuss. I learned this by tying ribbon onto an bag without support, and found it quite frustrating. You know, you do this, holding bag with one hand, attempting to tie with the other, the bag slips through the trial, and ribbon is vastly uneven.
Et voila, you have your fancy candy coated pretzel sticks, and will be loved by your guests. As always, quality control, and you will see you will love these too! They are yummy and delectable, and will add a sweet and classy touch, your guests might not know these were done homemade, but maybe by a candy company!
As pictured above, I created these treats for the holidays, and they were a hit! As family can often be biased, when I added these to their gifts, they honestly had no idea I had created the candy coated sticks! Such a great and simple way to add a homemade touch to any event, be it for a bridal shower, wedding, birthday, any event! You can personalize to your color theme, with your name or date of event, any way you want!
Enjoy and happy planning!