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For a few minutes at the Osterhout Libra

By Mary Therese Biebel mbiebel@timesleader.com
Features Writer

For a few minutes at the Osterhout Library one December Saturday, it was raining sprinkles.

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Young candy makers participating in the Osterhout Library’s Sweet Treats program all pitch in to create a ‘masterpiece’ fudge decorated with candy sprinkles. From left are Alicia Smith, Tommy Cooper, Shannon Yavorchak, Danica Cooper, Ally and Jessica Olszyk.

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All sorts of items can be doused in chocolate to become candy, as several young people discovered during the Osterhout Library program.

PETE G. WILCOX photos/THE TIMES LEADER

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Red ones, green ones and white ones streamed and tumbled onto a tray of smooth fudge that was still warm from a double-boiler.

Surely, adult bystanders thought after a while, the fudge was sufficiently decorated.

Surely, they thought a little later, the fudge couldn’t hold anymore.

But the six young people who giggled through a partylike candy-making session at the downtown Wilkes-Barre library thought differently as they took turns dousing and smothering their “masterpiece.”

“Oh, my goodness gracious,” young adult librarian Sarah Johnson said, looking dazed as she wheeled the tray away to be chilled in a freezer down the hall. “I love it.”

Young candy fans found a lot to love during a recent Sweet Treats program that gave them a chance to make such delicacies as chocolate-covered peanuts and pretzels, fudge that library staffer Cathy Yavorchak cut apart with a knife and a boysenberry/mint bark that the teens and tweens broke apart with a hammer.

“This looks like a pan flute,” 11-year-old Jessica Olszyk of Mountain Top said as she noticed how chocolate could act as a glue to hold several log-shaped cookies together.

“It looks like bamboo,” her 9-year-old sister Ally pointed out.

Sixteen-year-old Danica Cooper of Pittston drizzled a filigree of melted chocolate and peanut butter from squeeze bottles onto a tray of mini pretzels. After it hardened, the pretzels were similarly bound together.

“That looks pretty,” 15-year-old Alicia Smith of Wilkes-Barre said.

“I’ll just take this,” Danica’s 17-year-old brother, Tommy, said as he lifted a cluster as big as his hand.

“You don’t get to eat the whole thing,” his sister said with a warning in her voice.

The candy makers began their session by pouring melted chocolate and peanut butter into molds shaped like snowmen, angels, Santa Claus, Mrs. Claus and other signs of the season and ended by cheerfully pounding a hammer against boysenberry/mint bark to break it into small pieces.

Yavorchak and Johnson took care of melting the raw materials (mostly flavored discs from a candy-supply store) in a double-boiler in a kitchen down the hall, and the youths worked on the candy in the second-floor meeting room.

Another candy-making session may be scheduled at the downtown Wilkes-Barre library next year, Yavorchak said, but no date has been set.

Meanwhile, if you’d like to make some fudge yourself, here is the recipe she used.

CHOCOLATE/PEANUT BUTTER FUDGE

1 lb. dark or milk chocolate candy discs

1 lb. white chocolate candy discs

18-ounce jar peanut butter

Sprinkles, if desired

Melt chocolate candy discs and peanut butter in double-boiler (Cathy Yavorchak says that’s better than a microwave because the candy is less likely to burn). Spread onto a tray that has been lined with parchment paper. While it is still soft, add sprinkles. Chill in freezer. It should solidify in roughly 10 minutes. Cut with a knife.