These classic Chocolate Covered Cherries are incredibly easy to make, and always a favorite for Christmas, Valentine’s Day, or any time of year.
Our old-fashioned chocolate covered cherries recipe is so easy (and fun) to make. You bite into a rich chocolate coating that’s covering a melt-in-your-mouth vanilla and almond flavored candy, then a juicy cherry in the center!
These are the perfect Christmas treat recipe. These are perfect for gift giving or look so pretty as an addition to a Holiday cookie tray with other candy favorites like chocolate peppermint bark, Christmas Jello balls and buttercream truffles. Learning how to make chocolate covered cherries is not difficult with impressive results.
What’s the Difference Between Chocolate Covered Cherries and Cherry Cordials?
Sometimes chocolate covered cherries can be confused with cherry cordials. These chocolate-covered cherry treats do not contain alcohol like cherry cordials. Instead, these non-alcoholic chocolate cherry candies are flavored with vanilla and almond extract, so they can be enjoyed by kids and adults!
Ingredients Needed
All you need is 7-ingredients that are common to have on hand.
- Cherries – Make sure you use Maraschino Cherries with stems.
- Sweetener – Powdered sugar and light corn syrup.
- Unsalted butter
- Flavoring – vanilla extract and almond extract
- Chocolate – I decided to use chocolate almond bark, but you can also use chocolate melting wafers.
How To Make Chocolate Covered Cherries
These chocolate covered cherries are so easy make and will take you about 25 minutes. Also add about 1 hour for letting the chocolate firm up.
- Make The Sugar Paste. Stir together the sifted powdered sugar, butter, corn syrup, vanilla extract, and almond extract. Knead the paste until it feels like play dough.
- Cover the Cherries. Roll the paste into balls, flatten each ball into a circle, then wrap it around a cherry.
- Melt the Chocolate. Heat the chocolate in the microwave in 30 second increments until melted and smooth.
- Cover with Chocolate. Dip each cherry in melted chocolate and drizzle with leftover chocolate.
Set And Serve. Let the chocolate is set until firm. Serve and enjoy!
Tips and Tricks
Type of Chocolate – Feel free to use any type of chocolate you prefer. Dark chocolate, semisweet chocolate, milk chocolate or even white chocolate.
Candy Coating – To make the coating pink (pretty for Valentine’s Day), add some cherry juice into the candy mixture.
Cherries – You can also make these with cherries without stems. Just use a fork or slotted spoon to dip the cherries.
Dipping the Chocolate – When immersing the cherries in the chocolate, I found it made things easier to use a large fork to lift the cherries out and scrape off the excess along the side of the bowl. The chocolate can get a bit heavy for the stem and could easily be pulled off.
Serving Suggestions – We love to give these as gifts for Christmas or Valentines Day using a decorative can or Holiday bag. You can also serve these on top of vanilla ice cream, or next to a warm cup of coffee or hot cocoa.
Storing and Make-Ahead
- Storing. Leftovers can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days. You can also store in the refrigerator.
- Make Ahead. Wrap the cherries in the white candy mixture the day before and store them in the refrigerator before coating them in the chocolate.
Chocolate Covered Cherries
Ingredients
- 10 ounce maraschino cherries with stems
- 2 1/4 cups powdered sugar sifted
- 4 Tablespoons unsalted butter softened
- 2 Tablespoons light corn syrup
- 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoons almond extract
- 12 ounces chocolate almond bark
Instructions
- Add the sifted powdered sugar, softened butter, corn syrup, vanilla and almond extract to medium bowl.
- Use clean hands to mix this together. (You can use a spoon, but using your hands is much faster and easier.) It will start off dry but will come together eventually becoming the consistency of Playdoh.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Grab 2 teaspoons of the dough and roll it into a ball. Place the ball on the prepared baking sheet. Continue this process until all the dough has been used.
- Flatten each dough ball into a disk about 2-inches in diameter.
- Grab a cherry and mold the dough around the cherry smoothing it out all over. Place it back on the baking sheet and repeat the process with the remaining dough.
- Add the Almond Bark to a medium/small microwavable dish. Heat for one minute then stir. Heat for an additional 30 seconds and stir until it is fully melted and smooth.
- Grab the stem of a cherry and dip it into the chocolate making sure the entire cherry is covered.
- Allow the excess chocolate to drip off then place it back on the baking sheet to dry.
- Repeat the process with the remaining cherries.
- Once the cherries are dry, reheat the remaining Almond Bark and pour or spoon it into a small Ziplock bag.
- Snip a tiny corner of the edge and drizzle the chocolate over the cherries. Allow to dry.
Last Step:
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