Peppermint Chocolate Kettle Corn and what to do with ruined fudge

As I'm sure most of you are, we are all right in the middle of tons of baking goodness, none of which is the least bit healthy.  But man does it taste good.  I found a Peppermint Kettle Corn I could buy, but thought, we could do that.  So while my mom was in town this last week, we spent one afternoon just making goodies. 

For our base of Kettle Corn, we use Our Best Bites recipe (LOVE that site).  My mom has this really nifty Whirley Pop thing that makes Kettle corn a breeze, but if you don't have one, review their recipe to get you to the point of having the popcorn popped.

First, combine 1/3 cup popcorn kernels and 3 tbsp sugar in a bowl.

 Then crush 3 candy canes, fairly fine, but it's okay if there are some bigger pieces.  Do both of these steps prior to popping the popcorn.

 Set those aside, but not too aside, and pour 3 tbps oil into your pan.

Heat this up, just until you start to see smoke coming off the oil.

Dump in your popcorn and stir it up well, then hurry and close the lid.

 Making sure to stir (or shake going with the Best Bites method) the pan every 20 seconds, wait till all the popcorn is popped.

 As soon as it's done, open the lid and add your candy cane, then stir it up to make sure it's even distributed.  Salt your popcorn at this stage as well.

 Pour it out onto a cookie sheet to let it cool.

 While your popcorn is cooling, melt your chocolate.  We used about 1/8-1/6 bag of each brown and white chocolate chips.  I put them in the microwave for about 45 seconds on full power, stirring halfway through.  My microwave is VERY wimpy though, so adjust accordingly and watch them closely.

 After it's melted, put it in a bag (keeping them separate) and cut a very small bit off the corner.

Drizzle it all over your popcorn, then repeat with the white chocolate. 

 Admire all that pepperminty chocolatey goodness.

If you are planning on giving it away, as soon as your chocolate has hardened (you can pop it in the fridge or freezer to speed up the process), bag it up all cute, cause if you leave it sitting on the pan, it won't last long.  I pretty much just had this for lunch.  The peppermint was a little stronger the second day, so we suggest making it a day ahead of when you need it.

We also attempted a new recipe of white chocolate candy cane fudge (are you sensing a pattern?  I also have Chocolate dipped peppermint meringues coming early next week, I love chocolate and mint).  Well, I messed up and we WAY overcooked it.  My dad came up with the brilliant idea to crush it up and use it as a topping on ice cream, cupcakes, hot chocolate, whatever you want.  So, I threw it in the food processor.

Then added a few spoonfuls to my hot chocolate and man was it good.  And to think I was just going to throw it away. 

Enjoy!