Homemade NECCO Wafers

The NECCO® wafer folks have gone bankrupt and the candy no longer exists.  Sigh.
This was one of my favorites, and it occurred to me that the recipe should be similar to my homemade Altoids.

This image is from the original website 

which was saved on the wayback machine.

From Wikipedia:
Each roll of Necco Wafers contains eight flavors: lemon (yellow), lime (green), orange (orange), clove(purple), cinnamon (white), wintergreen (pink), licorice (black), and chocolate (brown). The ingredients in Necco Wafers are sugar, corn syrup, gelatin, gums, colorings, and flavorings.  ^[2]

(n.b.  the company website, as saved on the wayback machine, says it contains no corn syrup.)  Just can't trust wikipedia!


Let's try:

Color     Flavor
Orange   Orange
Purple    Clove
Brown    Chocolate
Yellow   Lemon
Pink       Spearmint
White     Cinnamon

Those are the colors/flavors I have at home.
I am missing lime, wintergreen and licorice (perhaps not much loss).
And I'll substitute spearmint for wintergreen.

I'll also skip the corn syrup and use confectionery sugar instead of corn syrup and regular sugar.

Techniques will be similar to my homemade altoids.

Mix 1/2 cup of water with 4 teaspoons gelatin, warmed and stirred until clear.  Then add 1/2 teaspoon Xanthan Gum.  Beat all the lumps out!  Put that into the stand mixer and add almost a two-pound bag of powdered sugar.  Divide into about 140 gram portions for coloring and flavoring.

I began with lemon yellow.  I started by cutting rectangles.  That's easy with a pastry wheel.

But then I really wanted circles, so I used a small lid.

Next I made orange.

 I think it needed more oil flavoring than I used, but I'll know for sure when they dry.

I did lose patience with those circles, so I just cut rectangles with the rest.

Then came chocolate.

I did not have chocolate flavoring, so

I used Scharffen Berger 100% Unsweetened Chocolate Cocoa Powder.

 They should be really good, I think.

I used two tablespoons of cocoa with about 200 grams of candy.

I also added some vanilla.

By doing lemon, followed by orange, followed by chocolate, I did not have to wash the equipment between batches.  The rest are strong enough flavors that there will have to be a serious wash-up between flavors.

By then I had had enough. . . I'll save the other flavors for another day.

Finished with clove (purple) and mixed mint (pink).
Alas, I overdid the flavoring - these two are very powerful.
Recipe needs tinkering in terms of flavor.

Made 1 quart of round and more than 1 quart of square.
Round and square taste the same. . .