In an email, Catherine Jarvis told me that her best home made candy memories are about caramels.
“The sweetest thing I ever tasted,” she said.
She can remember caramels wax-paper wrapped as well as chocolate dipped, though while she was eating them (as a child and as a teen-ager), she forgot to learn to make them.
I would like to fly down there and spend a day in the kitchen showing her how. Given that impossibility, I am going to blog some caramel candy recipes, and maybe even make a batch or two myself, to see if I still have the knack.
One person in the family did not forget to learn to make caramels: Rebecca, the most unlikely of all of the possible suspects: They are a regular of her cooking repertoire and she makes them year round.
Caramels
2 cups white sugar 1 ¾ cups white syrup
2 cups heavy cream 1 cup butter
Pinch salt 1 tbls. vanilla
Put sugar, white Karo syrup, salt and butter in heavy large kettle. Add cream. Stir well to dissolve the sugar. Put the lid on the kettle and bring to a rolling boil. Take lid off and lower the heat. This boils over easily. If using electric stove, turn down to medium heat,. Also turn down a gas flame, and continue cooking without stirring for about 35 minutes.
With the candy thermometer, test for 245 degree to 248 degree Fahrenheit. When testing in cold water, candy should form a firm soft ball.
Add 1 tablespoon vanilla extract. Remove from heat. Add one or more cups chopped walnuts, almonds or Brazil nuts. Pour into a well buttered pan, 8” x 8” and cool. When cool to the touch and almost hard, turn the pan upside down, and with your fingers gently bend the mass out onto a slab. Then cut into desired squares. Dip in chocolate or wrap in wax paper.
Alerting you to possible problems:
1. The caramels are going to burn if you are not making them in a heavy bottomed pan. Bonnie, there is a nice heavy bottomed pressure cooker downstairs in the cabin, if you want to try the test. I think on this front, Rebecca told me she has a special Teflon coated pan so that the mixture slips out of the pan and into the 8” x 8” pan like a dream.
2. The perfect temperature on the candy thermometer is variable, given the altitude at which you are living (this statement is actual and not metaphorical). It is better to do the firm ball test until you get a take on which is exactly the right temperature on your candy thermometer for the place you are living. Besides that, it is fun for the kids to taste all of those soft ball candy-tests-in-cold-water along the way.
Arta
“The sweetest thing I ever tasted,” she said.
She can remember caramels wax-paper wrapped as well as chocolate dipped, though while she was eating them (as a child and as a teen-ager), she forgot to learn to make them.
I would like to fly down there and spend a day in the kitchen showing her how. Given that impossibility, I am going to blog some caramel candy recipes, and maybe even make a batch or two myself, to see if I still have the knack.
One person in the family did not forget to learn to make caramels: Rebecca, the most unlikely of all of the possible suspects: They are a regular of her cooking repertoire and she makes them year round.
Caramels
2 cups white sugar 1 ¾ cups white syrup
2 cups heavy cream 1 cup butter
Pinch salt 1 tbls. vanilla
Put sugar, white Karo syrup, salt and butter in heavy large kettle. Add cream. Stir well to dissolve the sugar. Put the lid on the kettle and bring to a rolling boil. Take lid off and lower the heat. This boils over easily. If using electric stove, turn down to medium heat,. Also turn down a gas flame, and continue cooking without stirring for about 35 minutes.
With the candy thermometer, test for 245 degree to 248 degree Fahrenheit. When testing in cold water, candy should form a firm soft ball.
Add 1 tablespoon vanilla extract. Remove from heat. Add one or more cups chopped walnuts, almonds or Brazil nuts. Pour into a well buttered pan, 8” x 8” and cool. When cool to the touch and almost hard, turn the pan upside down, and with your fingers gently bend the mass out onto a slab. Then cut into desired squares. Dip in chocolate or wrap in wax paper.
Alerting you to possible problems:
1. The caramels are going to burn if you are not making them in a heavy bottomed pan. Bonnie, there is a nice heavy bottomed pressure cooker downstairs in the cabin, if you want to try the test. I think on this front, Rebecca told me she has a special Teflon coated pan so that the mixture slips out of the pan and into the 8” x 8” pan like a dream.
2. The perfect temperature on the candy thermometer is variable, given the altitude at which you are living (this statement is actual and not metaphorical). It is better to do the firm ball test until you get a take on which is exactly the right temperature on your candy thermometer for the place you are living. Besides that, it is fun for the kids to taste all of those soft ball candy-tests-in-cold-water along the way.
Arta
I make caramels but only when I put shortbread on the bottom and chocolate on the top and then they are called Caramel Shortbread Squares and the recipe is on pg. 133 of Company;s Company first edition Square Book! Or you may oder them on Lot #7 in BC when you are out there.
ReplyDeleteI think 249-252 is a good range.... even if you go slightly higher, the caramel works better for sharing (since you can break it and the pieces don't have to be cut.... the lower temperature is a dream, but more messy if you want to take to work to share.
ReplyDeleteah.... sweet caramel!!!!!