Rubina's Cake Shoppe

My children have been asking me to make chocolate covered strawberries for quite some time. I’m not usually big on Valentine’s Day, but this year all the holiday festivities around me inspired me to make them extra special for my little ones. I decided to have some fun and decorate the chocolate covered strawberries to look like love bugs. The look on my children’s faces and the excitement in their eyes when they saw the strawberries was priceless.

If you would like to light up your loved one’s day with some Chocolate Covered Strawberry Love Bugs, here is how I made these delicious and adorable treats!

Ingredients:

• 12 Strawberries (Medium to Large Size)
• 1 Cup + 1/8 Cup White Chocolate
• Pink Candy Color
• 1/2 Cup Dark Chocolate
• Red Candy Color
• Parchment Paper

Directions:

1. Melt 1 cup of white chocolate in a small glass bowl either over a double broiler or in the microwave. If you are using a microwave to melt the chocolate, place in the microwave for 20 seconds and then stir the white chocolate until all of it is melted to a smooth consistency. If you need to reheat, heat for 5-10 seconds at a time and stir in between. Be careful not to over heat it or the white chocolate will start to seize and clump up.

2. Add a few drops of pink candy color to your white chocolate and stir until the color is fully incorporated.

• Note: Instead of coloring your white chocolate, you could purchase pre-colored pink candy melts, although in my opinion, they don’t taste as good as real white chocolate.

3. Dip your strawberries into the melted and pink colored white chocolate and place on a parchment lined baking sheet. Chill in the refrigerator for about 10 minutes, until the chocolate firms up.

4. Melt your dark chocolate either over a double broiler or in the microwave. See directions in Step 1 if you will be using the microwave.

5. Dip the tip of the strawberries in the melted dark chocolate and place on a parchment lined baking sheet. Chill in the refrigerator for about 10 minutes, until the chocolate firms up.

6. Re-melt your leftover pink colored chocolate if need be. Color the pink chocolate with red using red candy color to turn it into red chocolate.

7. Place the red chocolate, which you colored in step 6, in a piping bag with a fine tip.

• Note: If you don’t have a piping bag, see this blog post on how to create a piping bag using a ziplock bag. You could also make a piping bag out of parchment paper, I will post a tutorial on that soon.

8. Pipe a red chocolate stripe from the edge of the dark chocolate to the back of the strawberry.

9. Pipe scattered red chocolate hearts on each side of the pink portion of the Love Bug.

10. Pipe a red chocolate smile on the tip of the strawberry. Place in the refrigerator to chill.

11. Meanwhile, on a sheet of parchment paper, pipe small red chocolate hearts with a long tip. Place in the refrigerator to chill for at least 10 minutes, until very firm. This will be your antennae.

12. Melt the remaining 1/8 cup of white chocolate and place in a piping bag. Pipe two small white dots above the smile to make the eyes.

13. Place your leftover melted dark chocolate in a piping bag with an extra fine tip. Pipe two tiny brown dots in the center of the white dots to complete your eyes.

14. By now, your antennae should be ready. Pipe two red chocolate dots right above your dark chocolate. Take your chilled antennae and place it on top of one dot. Hold it for a second until it is secured in place. Repeat on the second dot for the other antennae.

• Note: This step is a little tricky. You need to make sure that the red chocolate that you are using to “glue” the antennae in place is still melted but not too warm. Your antennae have to be chilled well and very firm otherwise the heat of your hands will melt the chocolate as you are working. If you find that they keep melting, then place them back in the refrigerator for a few minutes to firm up again and then come back to this step.

15. As tempting as it might be, try not to eat them all yourself and share these scrumptious little Chocolate Covered Strawberry Love Bugs with your friends and family!