How to Make Chocolate Skulls for Day of the Dead
Make chocolate sugar skulls inspired by the Day of the Dead following just 3 easy steps!
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One of the coolest things in the tradition of the Day of the Dead, besides papel picado, are the sugar skulls.
The sugar skulls significance is a bit gloomy, I have to admit it, they are a reminder that the only certainty for a human being is death. For the ancient Mesoamericans death was just a stage of life that extended to another level, something not scary at all. Sugar skull are also quite cute, especially if you decorate them with flowers, heart and other sweet things. They are also a really important part of the Dia de Muertos tradition and ofrendas.
The sugar skulls are typically made with sugar, water and meringue powder and decorated with frosting of different colors. You can find sugar skulls in stores or tienditas one or two weeks before you need to put your altar or ofrenda for the day of the dead, which is the first and second day of November each year.
This year we could not wait to see them in the stores, so we found a sugar skull mold on one of our trips around the city and decided to try to make some, but not with sugar, with chocolate!
Learn how to make them in a surprisingly easy way.
INGREDIENTS:
3D Sugar skulls mold (Similar to the one we got on a local store)
White chocolate. Get just a bit extra white chocolate for the sugar skull decorations.
Edible decorations like chocolate chips and colored edible confetti
Toothpicks
Learn how to make chocolate skulls inspired by the Day of the Dead! These are the ingredients for this fun project.
How to Make Chocolate Sugar Skulls inspired by Day of the Dead:
1. Melt white chocolate. Follow the instructions in your sugar skulls mold to make sure how much chocolate you’ll need to fill the shapes completely. Melt the white chocolate in a double boiler carefully. Check the temperature regularly. Turn off the stove when you get a liquid chocolate consistency.
2. Pour the white chocolate in your skull molds. Pour the chocolate slowly and carefully. Then put your chocolate skulls in the refrigerator and let them sit in the fridge for a couple of hours until the skulls feel firm and look completely solid.
3. Decorate your chocolate sugar skulls. Here is the fun part! With the white chocolate leftovers, do the same as step # 1 and melt just a bit of white chocolate in a double boiler carefully. When the chocolate is ready, pour it into small containers (like image above) and add a few drops of food coloring to each one. Make as many colors as you want!
Use a toothpick to decorate the chocolate skulls. I added some dots and flowers just by grabbing some melted colorful white chocolate and drawing on top of the sugar skulls.
You can also add gummies, chocolate chips and colored confetti as decorations. Glue these decorations with melted white chocolate.
Now that Day of the Dead and Halloween are getting closer and closer, I’m sure you'll be able to find lots of sugar skull molds, cookie cutters and even ice trays in fun and interesting shapes like these ones here. You can use the same instructions to create other chocolate shapes and decorate them with colorful melted chocolate.
Plus, these look cute but are also delicious!! I guess we are making more for November 1st.
