Kitchen & Food

#2 · Homemade lollipop stick

Pour melted candy into a mould, insert a chopstick, and wait. Instant artisan lollipop - or just stab it straight into a marshmallow.

Craft shops sell paper lollipop sticks in bags of a hundred. A wooden chopstick is food-safe, the right diameter, free, and already in the drawer - and for making sweets with children the supply problem solves itself.

How to do it

1. Snap the chopsticks to about 10cm and sand the broken ends smooth.
2. Melt your sugar or candy melts to the temperature the recipe specifies - hard candy is usually taken to the hard-crack stage, around 150°C.
3. Pour into moulds, or spoon discs onto baking paper.
4. Lay a stick into each pool while it is still liquid and give it a half turn so the candy wraps all the way round it.
5. Leave to set completely at room temperature before lifting. Warm candy pulls away from the stick every time.

Why it works

Bamboo is porous and slightly fibrous, so setting sugar keys into the surface mechanically rather than just gripping it. A smooth plastic stick relies on shrinkage alone, which is why shop-bought lollipop sticks are paper - the roughness is the point.

Tips & warnings

• For dipped fruit or marshmallows, skip the melting entirely - skewer and dunk.
• Sand the tip so it sits invisibly inside the sweet.