How to Use Chocolate Transfer Sheets

   Chocolate transfer sheets are sheets of thin plastic with a design printed on them, usually made from cocoa powder and food colouring. They can be bought from most cake or craft shops, or easily online. I've seen this stuff around a lot, but I've never really had the right opportunity to use it, until Valentine's Day. As you saw in my last post, I used these transfer sheets for the first time, with much success, with my chocolate valentine heart cakes.

   So I thought I'd show you how to use them.

You will need:

Chocolate, or chocolate melts

Transfer sheet of your choice

A bowl

Sharp knife or cutter - I used hearts (optional)

   Melt your chocolate in your microwave or a double boiler. Once it's all lush and runny, spread it over the transfer paper. The sheets are much bigger than what's shown above - about A3 size - but it's best to cut it into strips so that you only use what you need. Saying that, I cut it into strips and still used far too much.

   Spread it thin and evenly with a spatula over the transfer sheet, shiny side down, patterned side up. Don't worry about smudging the pattern - I was worried about it, because little goes the way I want it to with such things, but this went fine and there was absolutely no sign of smudging.

   Let it almost set. You can hurry it along by placing it in the fridge or freezer, and it will soften back up a little when you take it out. At this point you use your knife or chosen cutter to cut the chocolate up, then let it set completely.

    Once it's set, you can peel the plastic away, and the pattern will be left clearly on the chocolate surface. If you remelt the chocolate, the pattern will disappear, so you can use other transfer sheets with the left over chocolate.

   I pressed the chocolate hearts into the icing on my heart cakes. I've seen other people drizzle chocolate into shapes onto the plastic and stand them in frosting, and others still sandwiching chocolate between two strips of transfer sheets and creating looping ribbons with them. There are a lot of ways to use these things - look about and I'm sure you'll find some clever ways to use it.