Valentines Chocolates

Valentines Day. Every year the quest for another nice surprise is on. Great for crafters like me 🙂

This Time it had to be chocolate.

The Main ingredients

Maybe you’ve heard of (or even have had some) Baci, an Italian chocolate specialty by the Perugia company. They consist of delicious truffle like pralines with a whole roasted hazelnut on top. The name “Baci” means “kisses” in Italian.

If any of you reading this now thinks, “yeah, Hershey’s Kisses, all right”… you’re sooo wrong! There is a ginormous difference between Baci and Hershey’s kisses. Baci are a lot more tasteful to begin with. I spare you the rest, but if you ever get the chance to try one – do so!

The original quote

Now, each one has a philosophical saying or quote somehow related to love hidden under the aluminum foil it’s wrapped in. Think of it as the gourmet’s version of a fortune cookie 🙂

Except that many of them either suck or are poorly translated (and therefore suck too). Like many chinese fortune cookies that is… e.g. “Money is the root of all evil and a man needs his roots”.

See the unwrapping and a cutaway of a Baico (single form of Baci) at the end of this post.

Anyway, the quotes in the Bacis are from famous people mostly, but never really succeeded in really being cool to me. Just check out the one in the picture for a taste of that…

So I figured I’d combine some great things to make an already great chocolate even better:
A heart-shaped cardboard box covered in hearts, full of Baci which are wrapped in self made pink semi-transparent bands, each one with a really great quote relying to love and friendship.

The Details

For the box I used an empty praline box from Chocolat Frey for starters. I then covered the whole box inside out with paper I laser printed with various heart patterns found on The Net.

Next I made a photoshop file with countless times my beloved wife’s name on a pink background. I then printed that on medium strength vellum paper. Next I researched meaningful quotes and printed those on the back of the vellum paper.

Then I cut the vellum in strips, wrapped one strip around each of the 24 Baci and fixed the strip with a small piece of transparent Tesa tape.

Finally I put the Baci in the box, covered them with a heart shaped paper, finished the top cover with addditional heart-and-love strips and put the cover on.

And finally finally I put the box on the breakfast table on Valentine’s day. Sadly enough all the pics I took of the full box on the table were sent by imessage to some friends, and then I cleard out my chats one day without having the images saved beforehand.

Unwrapping