This skeleton spoon is excellent for dipping bon-bons, fruits or nuts.
To hold objects of different sizes, the soft copper wire may be bent
easily; and in this respect the home-made dippers are better than the
nickeled ones on the market. For dipping creams into chocolate, this
dipper is probably the best device which is available for the amateur.

Another help is the so-called rubber mat, useful for modeling wafers and
centers. This is nothing more than a sheet of heavy rubber fabric,
stamped so that molds are formed. Before using, place the mat in cold
water, dry, and then pour the fondant into the depressions until they
are entirely filled. When the fondant is dry enough to hold its form,
the mat is turned upside down, and the wafers and centers easily freed.
After being washed in cold water and carefully dried, the mat is ready
for use again.

[Illustration: Rubber Mat. Fig. 1]

The advantage of the mat is that all the candies are of the same size
and regular in shape, and that no material is wasted. For the girl who
intends to get only one mat, the kind with round molds--"truncated
cones," to be accurate--is the best to buy, because it may be used
equally well for centers or wafers. See Fig. 1 above.

The candy-maker who is prepared to spend more for her equipment may well
buy several mats, each with molds of different shapes. Then she should
reserve one shape for each flavoring or mixture, so that she can easily
distinguish by sight different kinds of creams after they are made. The
mats are sold by weight, generally at the rate of a dollar and a half a
pound. The one shown in Fig. 1 weighs eighteen ounces.

[Illustration: Dropping Funnel. Fig. 2]

Either to fill molds or to drop masses upon slabs or waxed paper in the
old way, the candy-maker will find a dropping funnel useful. This is a
small tin cornucopia with a long handle. Whittle a clean stick so that
one end of it will fit into the outlet of the funnel, and plug the hole
from above. Fill the funnel with the mass to be dropped, and then raise
the stick just long enough to allow enough of the mass to run out to
fill the mold--or if the old plan is followed, to form a wafer or cream
of proper size. See Fig. 2, on the preceding page.

Intelligent operation of the funnel makes the work more rapid and
accurate, and the mass holds its heat longer, and is kept better mixed
than if poured or spooned from a dish. Funnels especially made for this
purpose co