We are eternally grateful… for this popcorn!
How cute is this popcorn?! The aliens in the Toy Story films are so adorable, and fun, when I found this recipe by A New Dawn, I just had to try it!
The majority of the recipe is super easy and straightforward, all you need is popcorn, lime green candy melts and candy eyes. I had microwave popcorn already (we’re not called Popcorn & Princesses for nothing!), found candy eyes at Tesco and the candy melts online at Hobbycraft.
I started by microwaving the popcorn. I think in hindsight, I should have just bought a bag of popcorn, as it would all be popped, so if you’re looking to make the recipe, I would recommend that. Then I slowly microwaved the melts (for anyone wondering, they’re coloured pieces of white chocolate, which you can get in all sorts of fun colours!), on a low setting, stirring every 20 seconds. I have to say, the colour of my melts wasn’t as bright or green as in the recipe, which was sad. It still looks cool, but not as good as the brighter green, in my opinion.
Once the melts had, well, melted, I poured some into the bowl of popcorn and kept half a cup aside. I didn’t listen to the recipe very well when it was suggested to stir SLOWLY and promptly threw popcorn all over the floor! Once it was mixed in, I got a tray with some baking paper and spread the popcorn along it so it set. I have to say, it set really quickly, I thought it would take longer.
After that came the tricky part… Piping the remaining chocolate into alien faces! This was a lot more difficult than expected, and may have involved a few words not suited to preschool toys, but we got there in the end! The chocolate was very runny which made getting it to go where you wanted a bit difficult. The packet had suggestions for making it thicker, so maybe that would be a possible solution. I think the thing that really makes it obvious what the aliens are meant to be are the eyes! I wasn’t sure whether the chocolate would run if I put these on too early, so I left it a little bit, by which time of course it had set completely. Thankfully I had left over chocolate that hadn’t set, so I piped a little bit on the back and they stuck on fine. The only thing left to do was break up the popcorn (which was easy, as the chocolate wasn’t super thick) and pop in the aliens.
VERDICT: the overall effect is really cute, and I think this would be adorable for a party, particularly a Toy Story movie party. The chocolate was quite nice, it wasn’t as over the top sweet as I expected (probably due to it being such a thin layer). Would I make it on a regular day watching a movie? No, but definitely for a special occasion!
To sum up, in future I would:
- Buy a bag of popcorn rather than using microwave
- Find brighter green candy melts
- Make the chocolate thicker when piping
- STIR SLOWLY!
Exploring the world of Disney, one film at a time. 