Welcome to How To Cook That I'm Ann Reardon and
today we are making a camera made completely out of chocolate.
It is surprisingly easy to make this, the trickiest part was designing the actual template
which I do on my computer for you.
Lots of people have said where do you get the templates from?
I sit down and make them and I'll put a link below to my howtocookthat.net website and
I'll put the template up there so you can download that there.
The first part of the camera that we want to make is the body of the camera.
Take a sticky note and draw a mark at the height shown there so you know how thick the
body needs to be.
Find a container that is around the right size, mine is a little big but with chocolate
we can just trim it down afterwards.
Place the sticky note inside and line the container with acetate.
Acetate is just thin plastic and you can get this from chocolate shops, cake decorating
shops or even stationary shops as overhead projector sheets if you look there, you'll
be able to find them.
Pour in some tempered chocolate about half way up and then add in some fruit and nuts
and just push those down.
I have a video on my channel that shows you how to temper chocolate at home (it's called
CHOCOLATE SECRETS), if you don't temper the chocolate then at room temperature it will
be soft, it won't set firm and it will melt on your hands and be sticky so make sure you
watch that if you don't know how to temper and do that first.
You could, of course, use honeycomb or other things here instead of fruit and nuts, whatever
you like the flavour of.
And because we are going to cut it down to size it will give a bit of a pattern in the
chocolate, if you don't want that you can leave it completely plain.
Top it up with more chocolate so that it reaches the line that you drew.
And then drop it on the counter a few times to get rid of any air bubbles.
Then you just want to leave that to set.
Next we want a square of chocolate in the thickness shown, which is quite thick.
Find a container that is a little bigger than what we want and pour chocolate in there.
Now I'm not adding fruit and nuts to any of these smaller parts because they all have
to be carved down to size, it's just going to be easier if they're plain.
Tap it on the counter again the get rid of air bubbles.
Pour some chocolate onto some acetate and spread it so it is the height shown on the
template.
Pour some more and spread that out a little thinner, so that you have some of each height
that you need.
If you don't have acetate you can use foil instead.
Once the chocolate is firm but not hard use circle cutters to cut out the circles in the
sizes shown.
Some of the pieces have a circle cut out of the centre to make a ring and some are full
circles.
Just follow the template to get what you need.
Now I actually have a set of circle cutters which I think are just really good, I use
them all the time and they're not that expensive so I'll find the link to those, I'll dig that
up and put it on the website for you as well.
Continue to spread out the chocolate in different thicknesses shown for the various parts and
cut out all the circles and the little square and the different shapes.
Now I am going to use dark chocolate for some parts of this camera for variation in the
colour.
You can make it all one colour or mix up the white, dark and milk chocolate however you
like.
Just a tip once you've spread your chocolate if you give it a little shake the top will
smooth out.
This is the smallest circle cutter that I have but I need some circles that are even
smaller than that, so I am going to use a straw and for the slightly bigger ones use
the lid of a texta (marker).
And for the ones that are slightly bigger than that I'm going to use a piping tip.
Now the chocolate gets stuck in the piping tip because of the shape and if you try and
push it out while the chocolate is still soft you're just going to be poking holes and leaving
marks in the chocolate.
So just pop it in the freezer for a few minutes and then it will be easy to push it out.
Use a knife to cut around the template for the LCD screen like a frame there.
And cut the little rectangle, and all of these pieces are colour coded on the template so
you see where they belong on the camera.
Once your chocolate is firmer you can use your knife to neaten off your edges and shave
off a little bit so that the outside edge of the LCD screen is angled in slightly.
Now for your really thick pieces, make sure you cut them while the chocolate is soft,
otherwise you're not going to get the cutter through, then leave them to firm up.
Hold the circle using some foil so you don't get fingerprints on it.
And then cut straight lines across all the way around the circle.
Then using your knife cut in on an angle in towards the cut you've just made so that you
take out a little strip or a little chunk.
And you end up with a pattern all the way around.
Do the same thing on the thinner circle that is patterned around the edge as well, and
it tells you on the template which ones are patterned and which ones are plain.
Once your big thick body chunk of chocolate is set take that out of the container and
trim it to the size shown on the template.
And this sill be easiest if you cut an indent the whole way around the block at the level
where you want it to cut and then cut down so it will just break off neatly.
Look at all that fruit and nuts, mmm mmmmm!
Ok so now it is the right size but mine slopes out on the sides which means when I stand
it up the camera is kind of leaning forward.
To fix that I am just going to shave off a layer of chocolate.
Now if your container has straight sides then you won't need to do that but mine obviously
didn't so I'm just going to keep going until it's flat.
You can see on the template the camera body is rounded at the corners not square.
So again just using your knife carve off some chocolate so you get a nice rounded corner.
Wouldn't it be cool if it was this easy to carve wood, like if you could soften it and
make it set firm again.
I think I'd probably quite enjoy carving then.
We've got a couple more pieces to make.
So we need a square of chocolate that is sloped down, so we'll cut out the square first in
that thickness that's shown there and then trim it down to the slopes afterwards.
Pour your chocolate onto the foil and let it start to set.
Then trim around the edges so that you have a nice square.
Then just shave off the corners on each side on the angle shown on your paper there so
that you get a nice straight slope.
Once your chocolate in your container is set take that out and cut it to the square size
shown, again you'll find this easiest if you cut a line all the way around before trying
to push your knife all the way through it.
Put the template on top and make sure the edges are straight shaving off a small amount
at a time.
Now you can use these shavings on top of desserts on top of icecream or you can just put it
back in a bowl and re-temper it and use it for other parts on the camera.
Now flip that to one end and put the slope template on top and cut off the corners to
match the angles shown.
Turn it over to the other end and put the smaller one on top and shave off the chocolate
on an angle across the top, not quite all the way to the other end.
So this is what it will look like when you're done.
It will be skinny at the front like your template piece... fatter at the back sloping down and
the side and top look like this.
Thanks to everyone who said they love my nail wraps, these ones are called Confection Cutie
and there's junior ones of these as well, and I'll link you to those below where you
can get them.
Now to join our camera altogether.
Starting with the lens pipe some chocolate in the centre and add the next piece on top,
and you'll find this easiest if you put your chocolate parts on the template printout so
that you know which order they are in.
Then you can just stack those up.
Join together all the other little parts in the way shown so you have all the camera controls.
Let's turn up exposure ... and put it back right :)
Add the square piece on the front of the camera, slightly to one side.
Then add the carved bit to the top of that.
Now you can see the camera body has two lines around it.
So use a ruler to keep you straight and pipe lines of chocolate across the camera body.
Now to give the middle area a different texture I'm just using a pastry brush dipped in some
tempered chocolate and brushing it on.
Once that side is dry turn it over and do the same thing on the back.
You could use a chocolate transfer sheet or a texture mat for this patterned are if you
prefer, you can be as creative as you like with your camera.
Now because in the creation process of making this camera we have carved our chocolate you
can see scrape marks from the knife.
So to get rid of those just rub on a small amount of melted tempered cocoa butter in
a really thin layer and that will bring it up to looking nice again.
Add the controls into place, put the hot shoe on top and more controls on the other side.
Turn it around to the back and place the viewfinder into place and then the LCD screen.
Turn the camera over and lay it flat so that you can add the chocolate lens into place
on the front.
And your camera is complete and ready to eat.
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Champion of the week goes to Denny who did this amazing recreation of my Lightning McQueen
cake.
When you make a cake or anything from my channel make sure you put a photo up in the comments
section on the website so I can see it and the rest of the world can see it too.
Make it a great week and I'll see you on Friday.