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9/22/2008

Happy Fall!

Today is the first official day of Fall. The Fall Equinox. There are small signs all around, but I am ready to go into full Fall swing!

Nothing says Fall to my tummy like CARAMELS! (do you say car-mel or car-a-mel? I am a car-mel girl) So this fall I think I am going to tackle making some homemade caramels. I am still looking for the perfect recipe, but this one from Spinning Sugar looks pretty darn good. (It had me at cream!)




Caramel (Makes about 180 pieces) (I am so going to cut this in 1/2...or maybe even 1/4 because if I make 180 pieces I will probably eat 176 of them myself!)

2 cups whipping cream

1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk

2 cups light corn syrup

1/2 cup water

2 cups sugar

1/2 cup butter (1 stick)

Tempered chocolate for dipping, if desired

Line a 12×17 inch jelly roll pan with heavy duty aluminum foil, fitting the foil well into the corners and sides. Butter the foil very well, coating the entire bottom and sides. Set aside.

In a 1-quart saucepan over low heat, combine the cream and the condensed milk, whisking very well to blend. Allow the cream mixture to become hot, stirring often, but do NOT allow the mixture to boil.

Meanwhile, in a tall 4-quart saucepan, combine the corn syrup, water and sugar. Stirring constantly to dissolve the sugar, bring the mixture to a boil over medium-high heat. If sugar crystals appear around the edge of the boiling surface, wipe the pan sides with a damp (not wet!) pastry brush.

Clip on your calibrated candy thermometer and reduce heat to medium. Continue to boil gently until the syrup-sugar solution reaches 250 degrees (F). Add the butter and pour in the warm cream mixture. The temperature of the solution will immediately decrease. Stir constantly to blend the mixture, then occasionally until the mixture reaches 244 degrees (F).

Remove from heat and carefully pour the hot caramel into your prepared jelly roll pan, tilting the pan to even the mixture. Do not scrape the pan — even though scraping will not cause crystallization the stuff on the bottom of the pan has cooked longer, is tougher and will leave hard spots in the batch.

Leave the caramel completely alone for 24 hours at room temperature. This waiting period not only reduces the stickiness, but makes the candy much easier to cut. (Once the caramel has cooled and the pan is no longer warm, cover the pan with plastic wrap.)

Lift the hardened caramel from the pan using the edges of the foil. Using a clean, sharp knife, cut the caramel into approximate 1-inch pieces. (If the caramel begins to stick to the knife, rinse the knife well under hot water, dry and butter the knife, then resume cutting.)

At this point, you may dip each piece into tempered chocolate and allow them to rest on a wire rack for 4-6 hours until the chocolate has hardened. Store these dipped caramels on sheets of waxed paper in an air-tight container, at room temperature, for up to one month.

For plain caramels, wrap each cut piece in a 4-inch square of plastic wrap, twisting the ends tightly. Store the wrapped caramels in an air-tight container, at room temperature, for up to one month…if they last that long.

7 comments:

*~Annette~* said...

Do you have ANY idea how much I love caramels?!??!??

Jane said...

Thanks for the comment, I am Katie's sister and I thought I should admit to you that I always check your blog. I think it is a GREAT blog and I get a lot of ideas from you. Thanks! You are marked on my favorited list on my laptop.

Lorie said...

Jane! I read your blog too! I followed all the links of Katie's blog! I love Katie! And since she married my cousin and your grandparents were in my ward growing up that makes us practically FAMILY! ;D

The Berry's Patch said...

My neighbor makes these every C-mas and gives them to us. Yum! I forget to tell the rest of the family we have them. Bad me.

The Beauty Bargainista said...

yuuummmmm!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Valarie Lea said...

My MIL make a caramel cake that is so so yummy. Its just a yellow cake with homemade caramel icing on the top. I think I will call her and get her to make one. :)

Lorie said...

I need a neighbor that makes them for me! That is SO much easier! I wonder if any of my neighbors are reading this! ;D

The homemade cake sounds yummy! I made white cupcakes with caramel butter cream frosting. I just made my favorite batch of butter cream and put caramel sundae syrup in it and mixed! YUM! Stuck half a pecan on top and they were YUMMY!