A Savory Stew of our Favorites

Showing posts with label Candy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Candy. Show all posts

Friday, September 17, 2010

Chocolate Covered Honeycomb

How to make Honeycomb
Honeycomb
* 2 cups granulated sugar
* 1/2 cup Light Corn Syrup
* 1/4 cup Honey
* 1/4 Water
* 1 Tbsp (heaping!) Baking Soda

You need a candy thermometer. Do not attempt this project without one. Take a baking pan and rub butter all over the bottom of the pan and lightly flour it.

1. Add the sugar, corn syrup, honey and water into a pot that has at least 3 times the head space. The entire thing poofs up like crazy in a bit and overflowing sugar is a huge mess.

Honeycomb

2. Stir the ingredients together until smooth with no lumps.

3. Put the candy thermometer into the mixture. Turn the heat onto medium-high.

Honeycomb

4. Wait, no stirring, until the mixture reaches at least 300 degrees. The brown caramel color is what you're going for. Turn the heat off. Wait for at least a minute until the mixture has stopped bubbling.

Honeycomb

5. Add that generous Tablespoon of baking soda to the mixture. Stir. Stir. Stir. Watch for the poof. See it? It keeps growing.

6. Pour into your lightly floured, buttered pan. Don't fill it up all the way because the entire mixture keeps poofing.

Honeycomb

7. Let sit for 2 hours until hard. Hit with a hammer to break up.

8. Optional: Dip into chocolate for a sweet yummy surprise.

Honeycomb

From: soap-queen.blogspot

Monday, April 19, 2010

Chocolate Truffle Sauce

3/4 cup whipping cream
2 Tb butter
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
1 t vanilla

Put butter and cream in a saucepan and heat over medium-low heat until cream is hot. Do NOT BOIL. Remove from heat and add chocolate. Let it melt then whisk until smooth and add vanilla.

From: sisterscafe

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Cadbury® Creme Egg

1/2 cup light corn syrup
1/4 cup butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 cups powdered sugar
4 drops yellow food coloring
2 drops red food coloring
1 12-ounce bag milk chocolate chips

1. Combine the corn syrup, butter, vanilla, and salt in a large bowl. Beat well with an electric mixer until smooth.

2. Add powdered sugar, one cup at a time, mixing by hand after each addition. Mix well until creamy.

3. Remove about 1/3 of the mixture and place it into a small bowl. Add the yellow and red food coloring and stir well to combine.

4. Cover both mixtures and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, or until firm.

5. When mixtures are firm, roll a small, marble-size ball from the orange filling, and wrap a portion of the white filling around it that is roughly twice the size. Form this filling into the shape of an egg and place it onto a cookie sheet that has been brushed with a light coating of shortening. Repeat for the remaining filling ingredients, then refrigerate these centers for 3 to 4 hours or until firm.

6. Microwave chocolate on high speed for 1 minute, stir gently and microwave again for 30 seconds more. Stir again. You want the chocolate to melt slowly. If you heat it up too fast it may seize up on you, and you'll have to start over.

7. Use a fork to dip each center into the chocolate, tap the fork on the side of the bowl, then place each candy onto wax paper. Chill.

8. After 1 to 2 hours of chilling, dip each candy once more and chill for several hours, or until completely firm.

Makes 2 dozen candy eggs.

From: Top Secret Recipes

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Peppermint Marshmallows

1/2 c. powdered sugar
1/3 c. cornstarch
2 envelopes unflavored gelatin
1 1/3 c. sugar
2/3 c. light corn syrup
1/2 c. crushed peppermint candy canes (about 6)
1/8 tsp. salt

*Tip: to crush your candy canes, break them up in large pieces, then seal them in a Zip Loc bag. Put your bag on a sturdy cutting board and use a hammer to smash them into a powder. The finer the powder, the better.

1. Into a small bowl, sift together powdered sugar and cornstarch. Line a 9x13" pan with foil and spray with non-stick cooking spray.

2. Sift 2 Tbsp. of the powdered sugar mixture into pan and tilt to coat all sides. Leave excess in pan.

3. Place 2/3 c. water in a large bowl and sprinkle with gelatin. Let soften 5 minutes.

4. In medium, heavy-bottom saucepan, heat sugar, corn syrup, candy cane, and salt over medium heat until completely dissolved (about 7 minutes).

5. Pour into bowl with gelatin mixture and beat on high speed with electric mixer until light and fluffy (10-15 minutes).

6. Spread evenly into prepared pan. Smooth top and dush with powdered sugar mixture. Let sit at room temperature for 2 hours.

7. Lift from pan with foil. With a small, wet cookie cutter, cut shapes and dip sides in sugar mixture. Cut up remaining marshmallows into small, irregular pieces (these are the ones I let my kids and husband eat!). Or, using a wet knife, cut into 6 large squares and dip sides into powdered sugar mixture. Then cut each of those squares into 9 pieces and dip in sugar mixture.

8. Store at room temp, loosely covered.

From: littlebirdiesecrets.blogspot.com

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Chocolate Truffles with Sea Salt

8 to 9 ounces good semisweet chocolate
8 to 9 ounces good bittersweet chocolate
1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
8 ounces meltable milk chocolate

Heat chocolate and condensed milk in a double boiler over medium low heat until chocolate is melted. Stir—mixture will have a slight marshmallow texture.Stir in vanilla. Cover and refrigerate for two hours. Roll in balls, then roll in melted chocolate coating. Sprinkle with sea salt or other fine, coarse sprinkles.

From: thepioneerwoman.com

Monday, June 8, 2009

Springy, Fluffy Marshmallows

If you make these, let me know how they turn out!
About 1 cup confectioners’ sugar
3 1/2 envelopes (2 tablespoons plus 2 1/2 teaspoons) unflavored gelatin
1 cup cold water, divided
2 cups granulated sugar (cane sugar worked just fine)
1/2 cup light corn syrup
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 large egg whites or reconstituted powdered egg whites
1 tablespoon vanilla (alternately: 1/2 of a scraped vanilla bean, 2 teaspoons almond or mint extract or maybe even some food coloring for tinting)
Oil bottom and sides of a 13- by 9- by 2-inch rectangular metal baking pan and dust bottom and sides with some confectioners’ sugar.

In bowl of a standing electric mixer or in a large bowl sprinkle gelatin over 1/2 cup cold cold water, and let stand to soften.

In a 3-quart heavy saucepan cook granulated sugar, corn syrup, second 1/2 cup of cold water, and salt over low heat, stirring with a wooden spoon, until sugar is dissolved. Increase heat to moderate and boil mixture, without stirring, until a candy or digital thermometer registers 240°F, about 12 minutes. Remove pan from heat and pour sugar mixture over gelatin mixture, stirring until gelatin is dissolved.

With standing or a hand-held electric mixer beat mixture on high speed until white, thick, and nearly tripled in volume, about six minutes if using standing mixer or about 10 minutes if using hand-held mixer. (Some reviewers felt this took even longer with a hand mixer, but still eventually whipped up nicely.)

In separate medium bowl with cleaned beaters beat egg whites (or reconstituted powdered whites) until they just hold stiff peaks. Beat whites and vanilla (or your choice of flavoring) into sugar mixture until just combined. Pour mixture into baking pan and don’t fret if you don’t get it all out (learning from my mess of a first round). Sift 1/4 cup confectioners sugar evenly over top. Chill marshmallow, uncovered, until firm, at least three hours, and up to one day.

Run a thin knife around edges of pan and invert pan onto a large cutting board. Lifting up one corner of inverted pan, with fingers loosen marshmallow and ease onto cutting board. With a large knife trim edges of marshmallow and cut marshmallow into roughly one-inch cubes. (An oiled pizza cutter works well here too.) Sift remaining confectioners’ sugar back into your now-empty baking pan, and roll the marshmallows through it, on all six sides, before shaking off the excess and packing them away.
From: smittenkitchen.com

Monday, April 20, 2009

Chris' Lemon Fudge

First, Chris basically follows the recipe for Remarkable Fudge in the Better Homes & Gardens Cookbook which is:

4 c sugar
2 5-oz cans (1 1/3 c total) evaporated milk
[modification: he believes that powdered milk made as directed makes the recipe more creamy]
1 c margarine or butter
1 12-oz pkg (2 c) semisweet chocolate pieces
[modification: bakers chocolate has more butterfat because it isn't intended to keep it's shape - also makes the fudge more creamy]
1 7-oz jar marshmallow creme
1 tsp vanilla

Line a 13x9x2-inch baking pan with foil; extend foil over edges. Butter foil; set aside. Butter sides of a heavy 3-qt saucepan. In it, combine sugar, milk, and butter. Cook and stir over medium-high heat to boiling. Stir and cook to 236 degrees (soft-ball stage; about 12 min).

Remove from heat, add chocolate pieces, marshmallow creme and vanilla (add nuts here if you prefer); stir until the chocolate melts. Pour into pan.


For the lemon fudge, he used white baking chocolate, and 4 tsp of pure lemon extract. Then he layered ground unsweetened chocolate (he suggests 8 oz) on the bottom of the pan as a base for the lemon fudge. The unsweetened chocolate melts itself when the hot fudge is poured over the top. His first recipe he did not line the pan, and the unsweetened chocolate adhered to the pan and he had to heat the bottom to get it out in one piece. By lining the pan with foil, it stays together better - but not absolutely perfect.

From: Chris and Dani DuBois