Introduction: Mega Rocher

So I wanted to give my friend a gift that was personal and unique. After contemplating, and stumbling upon http://www.pimpthatsnack.com/ I decided to try making some large Ferrero Rocher.

Step 1: Gather the Ingredients

I almost recreated the exact taste of a Ferrero Rocher and everyone who tried it said the Mega Rocher was almost identical in taste and texture.

The ingredients I used were:
- 5, 13oz containers of Nutella
- 1, 72oz bag of semi-sweet chocolate (I used chocolate chips, but    chocolate bars can be used *as long as it's semi-sweet*; it's just more convenient to melt chocolate chips)
- 1, 8oz bag of chopped hazelnuts
- 7, wafer bowls from Carvel (or any ice cream shop)

Each Mega Rocher took 2 wafer bowls, 1 container of Nutella, and an un-measured amount of semi-sweet chocolate and chopped hazelnuts for the core and outer layer.

I used wafer bowls for the crunchy part of the Mega Rocher because it was the best way to get the crunchy texture so familiar to an actual Rocher.

Step 2: Create a Double Boiler

If you have a double boiler, then you can skip this step.

In a nutshell, a double boiler consists of a pot of water boiled on the stove top, and a smaller pot or bowl, that uses the indirect heat from the boiled water to cook/heat the ingredient(s).

For my double boiler, I used a coffee pot, filled with water, a ceramic bowl, and a strainer under the bowl to prevent it from sloshing round in the water.

Step 3: Make the Filling

For the filling, melted semi-sweet chocolate was mixed with Nutella. I used 1 bowl of melted chocolate per 13oz container of Nutella.

Initially the chocolate might not seem to melt at all, but stir every minute or so, this will help with evenly melting the chocolate.

Try to get no water into the chocolate mix, otherwise your velvety smooth melted chocolate will transform into clumpy chocolate pieces. This only happened to me once, and I didn't bother figuring out if it's fixable, just considered it a snack :D

If you plan to melt chocolate bars, break or chop up the bar to provide more surface area for heat to slip in.

Step 4: Fill the Wafer Bowls

First, even out the tops of the wafer bowl with a serrated knife, to prevent spillovers. Then pour the mixture into the wafer bowls. and pop into the fridge to let it cool down and solidify.

For the solid hazelnut core, take a few big pieces of the chopped hazelnuts, use a bit of the chocolate and Nutella mixture as glue, form into a small ball of hazelnut that looks proportionate a real rocher, and placed inside every other rocher halves.

1 batch of Nutella and chocolate mixture filled 2 wafer bowls.

Step 5: Coat the Outside

While the bowls solidified, a batch of chocolate was melted and the chopped hazelnuts were mixed in.

The bag of "chopped" hazelnuts I bought contained mighty big size pieces, so the hazelnuts were put through a food processor to make it a bit more finely chopped.

Once the filling is solid, coat the outside of the bowl with the melted chocolate and hazelnut mixture and pop back in the fridge, filling side down. *I recommend laying out aluminum foil to prevent any possible mess in the fridge*

Step 6: Unite the Halves

After the outer shell has dried, take each bowl and using the serrated knife to level off the top of the bowls, so 2 bowl halves mesh with each other.

Use a thin layer of melted chocolate to glue the top and bottom halves of the rocher and chill it in the fridge.

I had created 7 halves so I can give 3 Mega Rochers and have a halve to sample so none of the whole rochers would be sacrificed on the spot.

You might realize that together the halves don't form a perfect sphere like a real Ferrero Rocher, but it's close enough, given the structural ingredient used.

Step 7: Finishing Touches

The Mega Rochers can be given as is, but 80% of a gift is presentation, specially food based gifts.

I didn't have time to make big version's of the brown paper cups, so I only printed out enlarged versions of the Ferrero Rocher logo on sticker paper (and put on 3 layers of clear nail polish to give it a glossy finish), crinkled up gold gift wrap paper, covered up the Mega Rocher with the crinkled gift wrap, taped it to prevent unraveling, and stuck the logo on.

Overall making and finishing 3 and a half Mega Rochers took around 10 hours, including the time in the fridge and time that it took to learn and experiment.

If there are any suggestions of recommendations that could make future versions better, feel free to comment.

Step 8: More Pics


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