How to Make Chocolate-Covered Pretzels

You won’t be able to get enough of these chocolate-covered pretzels. They are easy to make, and the varieties you can make are endless.  They also make wonderful easy-to-make homemade holiday gifts that you can make ahead of time.

Chocolate Covered Pretzels

Snacks like chocolate-covered pretzels are arguably the best salty-sweet treat to snack on at any holiday or celebration. Amazingly, they are super simple to make. They look so fancy on display, but they aren’t at all. Besides that, they are fun to make. If you like this easy, sweet treat, then you’ll love homemade Reese’s, Jell-O Popcorn, and M&M Popcorn Ball Pops

Ingredients:

• Pretzel Rods – Utz pretzel rods are nice and firm. They hold up well as you work with them, but you can get whatever your local grocery store carries.
• Candy Melts – You can get chocolate melts at most grocery stores, but you can also use chocolate bark.
• Candies

Equipment Needed

• Bowl for each candy
• Medium microwave-proof bowl for chocolate
• Wax paper
• Tray
• Butter knife
• Plate

Types of Candies and Decorations

• Holiday sprinkles
• Chocolate chips
• Marshmallows
• Holiday candy corns
• Holiday M&Ms
• Mini M&Ms
• Oreo Cookies – crushed (leave some small chunks so people can bite into a piece of Oreo as they taste their pretzel)
• Other chocolate melts with a contrasting color.

Instructions:

Prepping

Place some wax paper on your work surface. If you need to move the pretzels before they dry then I suggest placing wax paper on a small baking tray so they can be transported.

Place bowls of candies out as decorations, and set out pretzel rods next to candy and tray.

Place candy melts in a microwave-proof tall glass or mason jar and microwave them for 1 minute. Stir your warm chocolate, and place it back into the microwave for 30 more seconds.

Set your melted chocolate next to your pretzels and candy

Take a pretzel and dip the top half of the pretzel rod in chocolate.

Roll it so all sides are covered. Pull it to the edge and tap it to release any excess chocolate.

Place the pretzels down onto the wax paper and decorate with your toppings of choice.

You can also use a fork to dip into another color of chocolate and wave it back and forth over the pretzel rod allowing the chocolate to drip off and make lines on the chocolate covered pretzel rod

Leave the pretzel on wax paper to dry. It should be dry within about 5 minutes.

Expert Tips for packaging your pretzels for gifts:

• Look in the candy-making aisles of department or craft stores for pretzel bags. Any long candy bag would do.
• Also, purchase twist ties.
• Wrap each individually to keep the pretzels fresh.
• Arrange in a bouquet or set into a decorative tin.

Keeping Chocolate Warm and Melted

Keep jars of melted chocolate in hot water. This is a tip my mom gave me years ago. She used to heat up water in a saucepan on the stove and keep her chocolate melted by placing her jar in the middle of the hot water. You could heat water as easily and keep it warming in a slow cooker on your counter.

Heating up more Chocolate

Add more chocolate melts to your depleted melted chocolate and microwave for 30 seconds.

OR – display them as bouquets in cups or jars for kids at the table

Tempering Chocolate

What is tempering chocolate?

Basically, it’s making it so that those little sugar growths don’t show on chocolate. When sugar blooms from expanding in heat, it can cause dark chocolate to get white sugar spots.

Tempering is easy to do; add room temperature chocolate to melted chocolate to temper it

Ideally, the melted chocolate should be between 110-115 degrees Fahrenheit when adding room-temperature chocolate.

Chocolate Seizing

This is what my mom used to call overheated chocolate or chocolate that was unworkable. She’d say, the chocolate seized. Which basically meant that it was thick and impossible to use.

Causes of chocolate seizing are typically overheating the chocolate or adding liquid to the chocolate.

There is a fine balance of heating and overheating chocolate. Once you overheat it, it turns thick and worthless.

There are tricks and tips to smooth the chocolate back out, but I don’t think it really ever fully recovers. You’ll basically want to add a form of lard in the way of vegetable shortening or coconut oil. Only use a tiny little speck. Add it to the chocolate and stir in.

The only drawback with having to smooth your chocolate back out is that it remains somewhat soft. It’s kind of like a Hershey bar that melts in your hand as you hold it.

FAQs

Make Ahead and Storage

Yes! You can absolutely make chocolate-covered pretzels ahead of time, making these sweet treats a great holiday snack to get out of the way days before your party.

Storing:

Store chocolate-covered pretzels uncovered on the counter for a few days

Store in an air-tight container at room temperature – in ideal conditions, which would be low humidity – for two weeks

I do not recommend refrigerating chocolate-covered pretzels

More Chocolate Covered Pretzel Recipes You’ll Love

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If you loved this post on making chocolate-covered pretzel rods, you will adore my other recipes, crafts, fun ideas, and more!

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~Melissa
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