Kristi's Friday Fixations: Super-Duper Frizzy-Fresh

Spring has officially arrived! And while I could certainly do without all of the pollen that's been coating my car, balcony, patio furniture, nasal passages, eyeballs, etc, I couldn't be happier for the season change. And you know one of the HUGE reasons why?! It's strawberry season!

Just look at those babies! Perfectly red, and ripe, and juicy, and sweet. YUM! I literally eat buckets and buckets full of strawberries this time of year (by the way, this website is a great resource for finding local, pick-your-own farms and is how I found a fabulous strawberry patch nearest me). If you're not drooling yet, just you wait...there's more!

Sometimes when I feel like making an impressive-looking dessert without actually having to put much effort or thought into it, I make chocolate-covered strawberries. And since strawberries have been particularly plentiful in my household for the past few weeks, I've been making a ton of them. They're just so darn easy and charming! Here's how:

The amount of chocolate you use is going to vary depending on how many strawberries you intend to make and how big your strawberries are. I use the individually-wrapped Dove's Milk Chocolate Bliss candies for my strawberries (but you can use any kind of chocolate that you like, really), and I've found that one bag of candy typically yields about two-dozen berries. You can adjust your amounts accordingly. In fact, if you're anything like me, you might just want to pick up an extra bag regardless because a handful of those candies almost always go missing--and by missing, I mean stuffed into my face.

Unwrapping each of those little guys is a bit tedious, but it's something you can easily do while watching the tube. Just zone out and let your fingers do the work. I always melt my chocolate over a double-boiler by placing the chocolate in a large glass bowl over a small pot of gently simmering water and stirring frequently until smooth. Just make sure that you don't get any water into your chocolate or it'll seize--basically get clumpy and gross and you'll cry because you've wasted so much chocolate. If this sounds intimidating, you can always microwave your chocolate on in a microwave-safe bowl at ten-second intervals, stirring after each zap, until smooth. You'll only want to do this until your chocolate is smooth though, otherwise you run the risk of burning it--and again with the weeping.

Line a couple of cookie sheets with parchment paper/wax paper/tin foil/whatever you've got on hand and prepare for dippage! You can either leave the strawberry stems on or off of your berries. I happen to think that they look nicer and are easier to dip with the stems on, but they seem to last longer if you remove the stem and dip the entire thing. It's really up to you. Grab those babies by the stem and dunk as much of the red part as you can into that smooth, chocolaty goodness (or toss your de-stemmed berries in and use two forks to get them completely coated). Place your coated berries on your prepared cookie sheet, refrigerate, and voila!

Easy peasy lemon squeezy! For this particular batch, I de-stemmed my berries and then decorated them with a little white-chocolate and dark-chocolate drizzle, topped with heart-shaped sprinkles; but you can get creative and decorate them however you'd like. Colored candy melts and sprinkles and patterns and designs--oh my! The possibilities are endless! And no matter what you do, you can be guaranteed that they are going to taste amazing.

What about you guys? What are your go-to desserts? I'm always looking to fill up my recipe book with little gems like this--any suggestions?

-K