This is a super fast and easy way to make your snack/appetizer table look festive. It’s very simple and doesn’t take much time, but guests love it!
Here’s all that you need:
- 2 bags of large pretzel sticks
- 2 large pretzel twists
- 1 round peppermint candy
- 1 bag of green candy coating/chocolate melts
- 1 bag of red candy coating melts
- Large round platter (or cut some cardboard and cover it with foil)
- Wax paper
- Small round bowl
*Note if you can’t find colored candy melts, you can use white and then add green sugar sprinkles to color it and make it sparkle.
Here's what you do:
1. Lay out plenty of wax paper to spread the pretzels out so that they don’t touch. Put a small round bowl into the center of the round platter.
2. Arrange the pretzels around the platter to get an idea of how they will all “fit”. Note that once the coating is put on them, they will take up a little more space. If you have some broken pretzels, that’s ok! You can use them for the top layer to add dimension to the wreath.
3. Melt the green candy melts in the microwave in a tall narrow cup. Start with one minute, take out and stir. Microwave more as needed, in 30-second bursts, stirring well each time, until the coating is melted.
4. Dip each pretzel into the green coating halfway up (use a spoon to help as you use up the coating because you won’t have as much coating to dip all the way into). Set on the wax paper to harden a bit.
5. When the coating on the pretzels has started to harden (almost solid, but not quite), start laying them out on the platter, around the bowl. Having them start to harden on the wax paper keeps them from completely sticking together (you don’t want people struggling to get them apart), but having the coating a little soft is okay. If they stick together a little bit, it’s still easy to break a pretzel off, and it keeps the arrangement intact as you move the tray around, so you don’t have to keep rearranging the pretzels.
6. Continue this process until you have just two of the pretzel sticks left to use for the bow. You can play around with putting the smaller broken ones on top and the spacing of the pretzels.
7. Melt a handful of the red candy melts. Coat the two pretzel sticks you saved and the two large pretzel twists. When they have almost hardened, place them onto the pretzel wreath to look like a bow (use the photo above as a guide). Dip the peppermint candy into the red coating and stick in the center of the “bow”. Put a little red coating on the top of the peppermint.
8. Once you're done arranging the pretzels, take the small bowl out of the center - and that’s it!
Like I said, super simple, and it makes an impression on the table. Every time I make dipped pretzels, people eat them up (and I’ve had people ask if they can take some home). This is something that can be done with small pretzels too. You can make lots of small wreaths, or make it a kids project and have the kids make their own little pretzel wreaths!
