DATES for 2023: Book your own date – just contact me with your prefered dates
TIME: 10-4 pm
COST: £295 for 1 person or £395 for 2 people for day course or £145 for 1 person or £195 for 2 people for 1/2 day course
TUTOR: Magdalena
GROUP SIZE: 1-2 students
SKILL LEVEL: Suitable for all
LOCATION: Bexleyheath, South East London – Kent Borders
HOW TO BOOK:
- Get in touch with your prefered dates and starting time
- Let us know what would you like to learn
- We’ll find a mutually suitable date, start time & discuss the content of your session
- Payment is by card or via bank transfer (details will be included in the confirmation e-mail)
This course is a great way to start with making your traditional sweets, but it’s particularly aimed at those who wish to perfect their sweet making skills, develop their own recipes or even start their own business.
The content of this Traditional Sweets & Confectionery Course is complete up to you
Depending on what type of traditional sweets you choose, we’ll have time to make about 5-6 types of traditional sweets or confectionery during the whole day and about 3 types during the 1/2 day course.
The flavours are up to you and we will decide on the final type of sweets when you book your day. The following list is just a suggestion, if you think of any other sweets that you would like to learn, just let me know.
- Traditional hard boiled pulled sweets
- Alcoholic Lollipops
- Marshmallows
- Salted Caramels
- Traditional Caramels
- Flavoured or Fruit Caramels
- Fudge
- Honeycomb
- Turkish Delight
- Saltwater Taffy
- Peanut Butter Taffy (and any other flavours)
- Double layered or filled chocolate bars
- Chocolate Truffles
- Coconut Ice
- Peppermint Creams
- Healthy Energy Balls
- Nougat
- Jelly sweets
- Fruit Pastilles
- Traditional toffee
- Traditional brittle
This is very much ‘hands on’ confectionery course, but all elements of sugar making will will include a demonstration. We will be working together on one batch of sweets at a time, that you will share at the end with your friend (if you are booking as a group). This is because some recipes can’t be made with a smaller amount of ingredients and we need to be paying close attention to all that boiling sugar! Saying that, you will end up with a huge amount of sweets to take home, regardless!
What will you also learn
- How to make traditional sweets at home (based on the types of sweets, you’ve choosen)
- How to safely boil and work with sugar
- What to do when things go wrong and how to rescue most recipes
- How to use simple confectionery equipment effectively and what equipment is necessary to use
- How to create boiled sweets using different methods
- How to flavour your sweets and create your own flavours
- How to adjust and create your own recipes for sweets
- How best to wrap and store your sweets
- Plus specific techniques relevant to your chosen recipes
What’s included
- Technique demonstrations and hands on traditonal sweets & confectionery course
- Date & Start Time to suit you – typically 10-4pm for the day session, but we can be flexible with start time when you book your day.
- Recipe pack
- Everything you make during the course, beautifully packed in professional packaging and decorated with ribbons and tags or in a food safe containers (as some traditional sweets need to set overnight)
- Light refreshments and light lunch (included in the whole day session only)
- Use of all equipment and an appron
Book your day
What other’s have said…
‘Thank you so much for last Sunday – it was great to learn more about traditional sweets and finally get my fudge recipe right! I’ve been really strugling before. I had to throw away so many batches of crystalised or burned fudge and I still wasn’t any closer to know where I was going wrong.
But taking the time away from my busy family life (with children running around all the time!) and having somebody to show me exactly what to do, was the best way to finally learn how to make a proper fudge. And of course the marshmallows and peanut butter taffy was fantastic too!’
Marion, Wrotham, Kent
‘Thank you for helping me to develop my own sweets recipe for my food business. It’s been really great to meet you and chat to you!’
Aysha, Faversham, Kent
‘I wanted to say thank you for welcoming me and my sister to your kitchen and helping us to perfect our sweet making skills. As you know, we were really beginners, but we’ve learned so much on the day! Since the course, I’ve made Raspberry Marshmallows for my son’s school fund raising event and it was a great hit! I’ve also impressed my friends with my lemon sweets at recent dinner party. So, again, thank you very much Magdalena, we had a great time!
Leah, Bromley, London
‘My daughter wanted to learn how to make marshmallows ever since she bought artisan lemon marshmallows at our local farmer’s market. I thought they would make an excelent gifts for our church roof fundrasing event, so I thought we would get in touch with you and learn how to make marshmallows at home. The day was a complete eye opener. I never imagined that working with sugar could be such fun! But equally, you’ve covered all the important elements of the sugar making – it was the first time I actually understood why working with sugar needs to be so precise!
Since having the marshmallow making day with you, I’ve made a very succesful batch of raspberry marsmallows and took it to our church commitee with my idea for a fund raising. Everyone loved the flavour and admired how fluffy the marshmallows were!
Doreen, East Grinstead, East Sussex
How I started to make traditional confectionery
I’ve enjoyed making my own traditional sweets for a long time now and always found it fascinating how such a basic ingredient as sugar can produce so many varying treats depending on temperature and few extra ingredients.
When I made my first batch of vanilla fudge, I was so excited! Until that point I could hardly believe that you can make traditional sweets at home – somehow I always thought you need to have a big factory, lot of complicated equipment and difficult to understand recipes.
The last bit is still very much the case – most recipes are fairly complex and mere change in temperature, consistency or slightly different ingredients can result in completely different sweets than the ones you are trying to make! That’s how I discovered the perfect recipe for banana foam sweets, once when I was making marshmallows.
Over the years people have been asking me for workshops on how to make traditional sweets at home, so here is a list of Cocoa & Heart Sweet Making Courses.
I’ve also included few resources for you and hope to see you at one of my courses very soon!
Until then – happy sweets making and be careful with all that boiling sugar!
Magdalena
