You know the drill: You bake a birthday cake, or have somebody else bake one for you, then you populate its surface with candles, light them, watch them get blown out, then separate the inedible melted wax from the frosting you do want. Depending on the candles and how many of them there are, this is not necessarily an easy task. You've also probably wondered, maybe every time you do this, why somebody didn't just make edible candles. If they can make edible underware, then why not edible birthday candles, right? 

Well, now somebody has. Husband-and-wife team Jonathan Steiner and Cristina Diaz-Steiner recently started the Chocolate Candle Factory to make, you guessed it, chocolate candles. All we can say is thank you; it's about time. 

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Steiner, who's been a chef for the past 15 years, started experimenting with edible candles four years ago. His baker wife, and high school sweetheart, joined the project and together they created a set of candles made not from wax but sugar, cocoa butter, cocoa powder, soy lecithin and vanilla. They've filed for a patent, by the way, in case you're now rushing out to find your own chocolate molds. 

Their chocolate candles now come in numbers, although the Steiners are working on other shapes, particularly holiday-specific shapes and including, yes, the standard birthday candle shape. “The number of flavor, color and shape variations is endless,” Steiner says. “We had a lot of fun making pink and purple swirled pink bubble gum candles for our nephew's seventh birthday this year.” Imagine.

Chocolate Candle Factory candles are currently being made and sold at Mignon Chocolate Boutique in Glendale, where the Eagle Rock natives now live. 

Among the many cool things about edible candles: not having to remind your kids NOT to eat them. You will, however, have to remind them not to eat the wicks, since string is still inedible, and to put out the flames before they touch the candles. Also, hopefully, before they eat them. 

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