Candy Cold Cuts Aka Sweet Sausages

This instructable shows me resolving one of my unsatisfied childhood cravings ;)

When I was a child I was always allowed to choose the cake my mom would make for my birthday party. I remember browsing through the baking recipe book, looking at the pictures and searching for the most desirable cake. One of the recipes I suggested for years - but every time my mother refused to make it, arguing "that isn't a cake". What annually catched my eye was a recipe called "Salame di cioccolata".

Salame di cioccolata looks like a salami but in fact is a mixture of sugar, cocoa, butter, eggs, cookie crumbs and Marsala or Port wine. It is shaped like a sausage and cut into slices for serving. Or like wikipedia explains: "Chocolate salami is not a meat product. The appellation "salami" stems from physical resemblance. Like salami, chocolate salami is formed as a long cylinder and is sliced across into discs for serving. These discs are a brown, chocolaty matrix (like the red meat of salami) peppered with bright bits of cookie (like the white flecks of fat in salami)."

In order to write this instructable I finally made myself a Chocolate Salami (though I'm not even close to my next birthday ;) ...) In fact I even experimented with some other sweets and came up with a complete "Candy Cold Cuts Platter": Sweet Blood Tongue, Candy Mortadella, Dessert Chorizo and Sugary Wieners are on the Menu! This process was awesome and a lot of fun - I hope you'll have as much fun making sweet sausages.

Originally the Salame di coccolata is made of cocoa, mixed with sugar, butter and eggs. I don't feel comfortable to serve raw eggs so I changed the recipe into a egg free version. Also in the traditional chocolate salami recipe cookie crumbs are used - I used chopped nuts instead. If you are interested in more original recipes just google "Salame di cioccolata" and use google translate...

Ingredients I used:

3,5 oz (100g) Dark Chocolate

1,75 oz (50g) Milk Chocolate

2 Tablespoons Butter

2 Tablespoons powdered Sugar

2 Tablespoons Nutella / Nougat Cream

1 cup chopped Nuts ( I used a Mix of Hazelnut, Almond and Walnut)

additional powdered sugar for decorating

about a teaspoon of butter for decorating

cooking twine for optional decoration

I went just for pure chocolate with no additional flavors but you could spice up your salami with a splash of liquor (Marsala or Port wine are recommended in my mothers cookbook) Rum might be nice as well. I suspect Vanilla, Cinnamon or Orange Zest to be nice additions too.

Materials I used:

a double boiler setup* (pot with a fitting bowl for melting the chocolate)

a bowl for mixing

a rubber spatula

plastic wrap / cling film

*If you are not familiar with the use of a double boiler take a look at step 25. If you prefer melting your chocolate in the microwave and know how to do that feel free to do so.

I had bought already chopped almonds and hazelnuts, but the walnuts I had to chop myself.

The following isn't essential, but I like the taste of toasted nuts so I carefully roasted on low heat. - but you can use them untested as well.

Break the chocolate in small pieces and heat them in the double boiler.

Stir occasionally until the chocolate is completely melted. Take the pot off the stove and let it cool a little. Meanwhile you can mix the powdered sugar with the butter and the nutella. When the chocolate cooled to a point where it is quite viscid but not as liquid as before add it to the sugarbutternutella mixture. Mix and add the nuts.

Make sure your chocolate mix isn't to liquid anymore, otherwise wait a little longer to let it cool down. (When the mix is to liquid ist hard pack it up in wrap) Place a big pice of plastic wrap on your workspace and put the chocolate nut mixture roughly in a sausage like shape on it. Fold the plastic wrap over and roll the sausage so it is covered in wrap. Tie both ends of the sausage with cooking twine.

If you want just a simple salami you can skip the next step of twine decoration. Just place your sausage in the fridge and let it cool and rest for several hours or over night.

If you want to fancy up your salami with some twine you should place the twine while the chocolate is still shapeable. Use two long strands of cooking twine, secure them on one end of the sausage and enwind the salami. Don't make knots, just interlace the two stands when they cross each other - you'll later have to remove the twine in order to peel the salami out of the palstic wrap (and after peeling you'll have to wind the twine back again).

When you're happy with the twine design on your salami, place it in the fridge and let it "cure" for several hours or over night.

Unwind the salami from the twine and unwrap it.

Brush the sausage with soft butter and then cover the whole surface with powdered sugar. Either tap the salami a little or use a dry brush to remove the excess sugar.

If you've chosen the plain salami style your Chocolate Salami is now complete.

If you chose the twine decoration you now can carefully add the twine strands again in the same pattern. I recommend to wear food grade vinyl gloves for this task, it makes it a bit easier not damage the powdered surface of the sausage. I didn't wear them and had to re-dust some spots with powdered sugar.

A final tip: It can be tricky to cut the salami into slices. Don't try to cut too thin. I recommend doing some test cuts before serving. I made several chocolate salamis in the process of making this instructable, some were easier to cut when they where at room temperature, some were easier to handle when they cam just from the fridge...

Instead of preparing one giant salame di cioccolata you can also make a lot of tiny ones. All you have to do is to spread less mixture on the plastic wrap (in order to get a smaller sausage diameter). Roll up the wrap as you would do it with the big salami. Then separate the long and thin sausage with additional cooking twine in order to shape tiny sausages. Proceed as with the big one: let cool in the fridge, unwrap, dust and enjoy.

When I finished my Salame di cioccolata I was kind of hooked on the Idea of transforming sweets into sausages. I thought about melting and transforming gummy bears into sausages but soon came to the conclusion that marshmallows resemble meat products much better and may be the better choice. But - as I soon figured out - melting marshmallows result just a mainly sticky and hard to shape mess. So I came up with a kind of brilliant solution. I mixed the melted marshmallows with white chocolate. The result is a chewy candy, the texture reminds me a lot of candy like "Maoam" or "Mamba" (I read these german candies are kind of equivalent to saltwater taffy or "Laffy Taffy" but I've never tasted those myself). The taste of the Mortadella is very creamy-marshmallowy.

I had a lot of fun developing this recipe and highly recommend trying. It is one the easiest recipe in this collection and also deceptively real-looking.

Ingredients you need:

2 cups of small marshmallows

1/2 cup white chocolate (100g or 3,5oz)

a handful of shelled pistachios

some additional white marshmallows

some drops of red food coloring

Tools you need:

a double boiler setup* (pot with a fitting bowl for melting marshmallows and chocolate)

a rubber spatula

parchment paper to roll up the sausage (plastic wrap / cling film might work as well)

cooking twine or rubber bands

*If you are not familiar with the use of a double boiler take a look at step 25. If you prefer melting your chocolate in the microwave and know how to do that feel free to do so.

Place the marshmallows in the double boiler and heat it up. It takes sometime until they start to melt, so be patient and stir from time to time. When marshmallows are almost melted add some drops of red food coloring. Stir well to distribute the color, if you need more color add and stir again. Eventually you'll end up with a piggy rose colored super sticky goop. Now turn off the heat and add the white chocolate. Stir constantly and use the residual heat to melt and incorporate the chocolate. (If the residual heat is to weak to melt the chocolate - turn on the heat again.)

When chocolate and marshmallows are combined to a uniform mass you can continue with the next step.

Now the mixture should be warm enough to be shaped but cool enough to touch. Take half of the mass and spread it out on the parchment paper (I used my fingers for this). Then sprinkle the pistachios and the white marshmallows on this and cover with the rest of the mass. It doesn't need to look nice this step is just to make sure the "lard" and the pistachios are evenly distributed. Roll up the the whole thing to form a cylindrical clump. Adjust the shape to your desired sausage size and roll it up tightly in parchment paper (plastic wrap could work as well, but I haven't tried it in this recipe yet). Pinch the surplus parchment paper to form the typical sausage ends and fix with rubber bands or cooking twine.

Let the sausage rest and cool down in the fridge for a few hours or over night. - And enjoy the pretty result.

The "Blood Tonge" recipe combines the chocolaty base of the Salame di chocolate with some colorful marshmallow "meat". I think it looks pretty neat.

Ingredients:

3,5 oz (100g) Dark Chocolate

2 Tablespoons Powdered Sugar

2 Tablespoons Butter

2 Tablespoons Nutella / nougat cream

about 2 Tablespoons small white Marshmallows

about 2 Tablespoons small pink Marshmallows

3 Tablespoons chopped Hazelnuts

Marzipan or Fondant for the casing

Tools you need:

a double boiler setup* (pot with a fitting bowl for melting marshmallows and chocolate)

a bowl for mixing

a rubber spatula

plastic wrap to roll up the sausage

cooking twine or rubber bands

*If you are not familiar with the use of a double boiler take a look at step 25. If you prefer melting your chocolate in the microwave and know how to do that feel free to do so.

Start with chopping. If you haven't already bought chopped nuts chop them. Take the white marshmallows and cut them into small pieces.

Add powdered sugar, butter and nougat cream in a bowl and mix well.

Melt the dark chocolate in the double boiler and let it cool down a little. It should still be viscid but not runny

Add the melted chocolate to your sugarbutternutella concoction and mix well. Add nuts and white marshmallows and mix again. Then finally add the pink marshmallows, incorporate them but don't stir too savagely.

Distribute the mix on a pice of plastic wrap and roll it up to a sausage as explained in step 4. Place it in the fridge for several hours or over night.

When the sausage had rested for several hours in the fridge take it out and unwrap it. Cut off the sausage-ends and take away the cling film.

To make the casing I rolled up a piece of marzipan of about the size of my index finger (it was one of the marzipan sausages you'll learn about in step 21) I assume you could use fondant for this step, it might even look better - but I have no experience with fondant so far, and the marzipan was right on hand so I used it.)

Place the marzipan between two pieces of plastic wrap and roll it out.Take away the upper plastic wrap, place the sausage on the marzipan sheet. Wrap the casing around the sausage while the second plastic wrap is still attached. Trim any surplus marzipan on the side and pinch the marzipan at the end to form a nice sausage-end. decorate the end with some kitchen twine.

I stumbled across the inspiration for this recipe when searched for inspiration on how to make a egg free version of salame di cioccolata. I own a book about confection printed in early 1980 (I found it a while ago at a "public bring and take bookshelf" and it is awesome) While searching for chocolate truffle recipes I stumbled across a recipe called "Prune Sausage" which mainly consists of prunes, sugar, ground almonds and egg yolk. I used this as an inspiration to come up with an egg free, dried fruits sausage.

I'm pretty pleased with the result of my version. It looks pretty convincing and is a "healtier" confection than the rest of the sweet sausage platter. You can taste a hint of marzipan but in general it isn't very sweet. (If you like it sweet you may ad powdered sugar. I'm not sure if honey or agave syrup would work as well, the mass might probably become too sticky...) If you like energy bars made of dried fruit you might like this sausage.

The chorizo I made is pretty large (about 16inches long / more than 1 inch in diameter)(40 cm long and about 3 cm diameter) You may cut in half the ingredients...

Ingredients I used:

1/2 cup of prunes

1/2 cup of raisins

3 tablespoons of marzipan (If you absolutely hate the taste of marzipan you may use 1,5 tablespoons of almond butter and 1,5 tablespoons of powdered sugar instead)

1/2 cup of dried cranberries

1/2 cup of dried apricots

1/2 cup of roughly copped walnuts

some drops of red food coloring

powdered sugar for dusting and dekoration

some soft butter for preparing and the casing

If I'll make the chorizo again I will lower the amount of prunes and raisins and raise the amount of apricots accordingly. I think the color of the sausage could be a bit brighter. Also, although I don't dislike prunes and raisins, I think I like the taste of apricots more...

Chop up the prunes and raisins (except for about a tablespoon of each) in a food processor until it becomes a sticky ball. Transfer it into a bowl and mix with the marzipan. (I then added some red food coloring to the mix but it didn't have much of an effect since the mass is rather dark in color. You may want to skip this.)

Roughly chop the remaining dried fruits and the walnuts. Add them to the sticky mass and mix well.

You can leave the chorizo as it is, dust it with a little bit of powdered sugar or add a "casing" as I did.

For the casing first brush the surface of the sausage with soft butter, then roll it in some powdered sugar and then remove all the loose sugar dust with a dry brush.

Enjoy your Fruit Chorizo!

Compared to the other sausages the Wieners seem a little lame. But they are very easy to make and even suitable to make for kids. Obviously marzipan wieners are only a joy for marzipan lovers - If you don't like marzipan you should't eat these wieners...

Ingredients:

about 1/2 cup of marzipan (100g)

powdered sugar (the amount depends on the quality of your marzipan, I used about a 1/4 cup)

some drops of red food coloring

Tools:

plastic wrap

kitchen twine

First test the moldability of your marzipan. The marzipan was pretty soft and kind of difficult to shape. So I kneaded in powdered sugar until it became a easy shapeable dough.

Then add little by little some drops of food coloring and knead to distribute it evenly. When you reached your desired color continue with the next step.

First roll the marzipan to a long cylindrical shape. Wrap that cylinder in plastic wrap and constrict parts in the length of wieners with kitchen twine.

Cut with a sharp knife though the strangled parts and unwrap the wiener. Voila!

- Store the finished sausages wrapped in plasic wrap, and preferably in an airtight container, in the fridge.

- Handle the finished Sausages with care. I recommend using food grade vinyl gloves to leave no fingerprints on the sausages surface.

- Cutting the chocolate based sausages can be tricky. Don't try to cut too thin slices. Test if your chocolate sausage prefers to be cut at room temperature or when it comes fresh from the fridge. I recommend placing two fingers at the front of the sausage while you cut.

- Decoration is kind of important for this kind of deceptive food. I accompanied my sausages with real gherkins, mustard, radishes and parsley. I would love to find a way to make sugary versions of these decorations but I haven't any good ideas.

- I think the Candy Cold Cuts would make a great dessert for a dinner at the first of April. It's a pity the next April first is so far away...

- I hope this instructable inspires you to make your own sweet cold cuts und I'd like to encourage you to experiment with recipes - I found so much fun and satisfaction in experimenting I highly recommend it!

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Some notes on the double boiler:

You shouldn't melt chocolate (or marshmallows) directly on the stovetop since it's prone to burn or seize when the temperature is to high. Us a pot filled with some water and place a slightly smaller pot or bowl inside it. This way the temperature in the inner pot doesn't reach over 100°C / 212°F and your chocolate is safe. (Also be very careful not to spill any water into your melting chocolate. It will seize...)