Classic Caramel Candies and Sauce

My family adores caramels! I have made many jars of caramel sauce and loaves of deliciousley chewy candies over the years, including a totally vegan option we recently added to our repertoire. This basic caramel recipe can be made into chewy candies or a decadent sauce and you can also really have fun playing with additional flavors (eggnog caramel anyone?) I hope you enjoy it as much as we do!

Ingredients:

1 cup Sugar

2-3 TBSP Rice syrup

1/2 cup heavy cream

7 Tbsp Butter

1 tsp Salt

1-2 tsp vanilla or other extract of choice

optionally a teaspoon or so of dry spices like cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cloves…

Method:

In a medium sauce pot add the sugar and rice syrup, add just a little water to help the sugar start to melt.

In another pot add the remaining ingredients. Put both pots over low heat.

Stir the sugar mixture constantly to help it dissolve. Once the coconut oil and cream mixture is warm and uniformly combined you can turn it off and just leave it to the side.

When the sugar mixture begins to bubble slightly and is fairly dissolved, stop stirring. Now you watch until the mixture reaches the color you like, I usually go for a copper penny hue myself.

Once the desired color is reached, slowly and carefully add the coconut mixture into the sugar mixture, stirring continually the whole time. This will bubble up and spit so be careful!

Continue to heat over medium/low heat until the mixture thickens, around 250-300f. (My thermometer is not digital and definitely not very accurate, so I don’t go much off of the temperatures…) When it starts to look gloopy and thick you can drop a bit in ice water to check the consistency.

Cooking more = harder candy, less = softer. If you want a caramel sauce instead of chewy bites simply cook to around 220f, before it gets super gloopy in the pan, and pour into small canning jars.

Once it is done to your satisfaction, pour into a silicone or parchment lined mold (or into half pint canning jars if you made sauce) and allow to cool overnight.

If you are feeling particularly rebellious, I also can my caramel sauce for long term pantry storage. Simply add hot caramel sauce to warm clean jars, leave about 1 inch head space and water bath for 10 minutes. This is not a USDA approved recipe for canning.

Once the caramel loaf is cool, slice, wrap in parchment squares, and enjoy within a month or two!

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I get all the ingredients for this recipe, including amazing canning jars for when I make caramel sauce, from AZURE STANDARD

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