Danish Chocolate Marzipan

submitted by totototo
from Victoria, BC

This is a two-step recipe:

Step I. Make almond paste:

1 lb blanched almonds

run through meatgrinder 3 or 4 times. You *can* use a food
processor or a blender for this step, but the pressure of a
meatgrinder or other screw-fed chopper squeezes some of the oil
out of the almonds and improves the end result. It's at this very
first step that a meatgrinder is superior to other methods.

Make a simple syrup from

1 lb sugar
1 cup water

and cook it to 240F. Mix in the ground almonds and add

1/2 cup orange juice
2 or 3 *tiny* drops of bitter almond oil (I use drops from a toothpick to
measure this so I don't accidentally spill in too much and spoil
everything.)

Be very sparing with the bitter almond oil. Fannie Farmer doesn't
say to use it, but I find that it heightens the almond flavour.
Another recipe for marzipan that I have somewhere says to use a
tiny number of bitter almonds when making the paste, just two or
three, but bitter almonds are supposedly unavailable now because
they are poisonous in large quantities and I've never gone
looking for them. Mix until the paste is smooth and creamy.
Pour out on a cold surface (marble, heavy pottery) that's been
dusted with powdered sugar and let it cool.
Age for at least a week in an air-tight container before using.

Makes 2 lbs.

Step II: Make marzipan from almond paste

Mix together
1 cup almond paste
1 cup confectioner's sugar
a few drops of rose water
(the book says you can also use orange extract, but that rose water is the
traditional flavouring)
Rose water is available if you ask around. Some good pharmacies
carry it.

Knead this mixture on a cold marble slab or heavy platter for 20
minutes. Voila! Marzipan.

You can dip this in chocolate, make faux fruits out of it colored
with food colors, crystallize it, put it on top of a dark fruitcake to
make a true English-style "Christmas cake", or just eat it out of hand if
you are a swine.
A friend who is a marzipan lover once got a 2 lb lump of homemade
marzipan from me for Christmas. She was in second heaven.
You can buy excellent marzipan, of course, but the homemade per
this recipe is cheaper and just as good, if not better.


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