West or
southwest 4 or 5, occasionally 6 later.
Smooth or
slight, becoming slight or moderate.
Occasional
rain and fog patches until later.
Moderate or
good, occasionally very poor until later.
Ever looked
outside your window in the garden and thought: “Oh, the kids play so nicely I
wish I can rustle up some treats for them?” No??? Me neither. If they were for
once not arguing or in danger, I was so relieved that I treated myself to a
coffee and hoped the peace lasts until I finish it.
But I did
open the cupboard on occasions and wanted something sweet. And good. But there
was none.
No more
putting the coat on and looking miserable at the display at the late night
petrol station: I present the super quick ultimate treat: A microwave
fudge/toffee/caramel.
While they
are all different, they are also similar and since this recipe defies all fudge
making rules, I am not sure what it is.
Let`s say I
present you a bonbon (love that song!).
Chewy, soft,
buttery, sweet caramel bonbons.
If you ever
tried to make fudge you probably had some not so nice outcomes. The culprit is
sugar=sucrose. Sucrose has a tendency to crystallize when making fudge. When
you dissolve sugar in a liquid, and then begin to cook this mixture, the water
begins to evaporate. This leaves obviously less and less water for the sugar to
be dissolved in and the sucrose clusters together, forming large crystals.
Larger than they were before. So you might end up with something gritty. There
are several ways to prevent this. Either add more fat or more acid, which will
split the sucrose into glucose and fructose. Or add more glucose. And of course
whisk the hell out of it. But only after it has reached a certain temperature
and then got colder. So you need to follow a recipe and work with a sugar thermometer.
Not with
this recipe. It is one of these “first attempt strike luck” recipes.
I saw this video here and wanted to find out if it works. But of course in smaller quantities. And
less sugar. But I liked the technique so I started with something dead simple
and wanted to improve it from my mistakes. There were none. I was so puzzled by
this unexpected result that I made three more batches, each with different
flavouring. Still perfect. So it seems that this is one of the few occasions where
the amount of ingredients worked like a dream in my 850 microwave.
This also
means you can’t just double the ingredients. But first of all it is enough for
a treat and second you can make several batches with different flavours (I made
mine with vanilla paste, chocolate syrup (which I normally put in the coffee),
Amaretto and Baileys Original Irish Cream. While the alcohol flavouring is
obviously a no- go for small children, who says they should have all the fun.
As with all
simple recipes, use the best of the ingredients. I made mine with salted butter
from Brittany. I personally believe it needs either salted butter or a tiny
pinch of salt, but if you want to cut your salt intake or your children are
very small, you can leave it out.
Super quick caramel bonbons
1 tbsp of
melted butter
1 tbsp of condensed milk (not evaporated milk)
1 tbsp of
white sugar
1 tbsp of liquid
sugar (glucose syrup, white corn syrup or golden syrup. I used golden syrup
which is sweeter than glucose syrup)
Flavouring.
Amount depends if it is dry or liquid. If you use alcohol/syrup I say one
teaspoon is enough.
As you can
see, all in the same amount apart from the flavouring. But if you use more liquid
flavouring it will be even softer.
Add all the
ingredients into a large cup (it bubbles up a bit so don’t use a too small
cup), stir with a fork and put into the microwave. It needs to cook for a total
of 2 minutes, but it is important that you do that in 4 batches at 30 seconds each.
Between each heating you need to stir like mad. The first two times to
distribute it evenly, the second two times to get your caramel right.
So in it
goes for 30 seconds. Out and stir. It will be barely heated yet. In it goes
again. For 30 seconds. If you take it out now and stir, you will already see
small bubbles. From this point forward DONT put your fork or spoon or whatever
you use for stirring into your mouth again. Liquid sugar is hotter than boiling
water. If you want to see how it gets on and might taste, let one drop fall on
a plate and taste that after you finished stirring and the caramel is in for
its 3 turn. It will bubble seriously when you take it out but will get calm
when you stir. You should see, while you stir, how the caramel develops.
And in it
goes for the last time. When you take it out now it not only bubbles, but will
continue to bubble for a second or two when you stir. Just beat the hell out of
it and you will see that it gets shiny and smooth and thick. Beat, beat, beat.
Then pour it into a dish lined with buttered paper or one of the waxed baking
sheets and put it into the fridge. It will be a rather thin sheet, looking more
like the covering of a cake than a bonbon. Don’t worry, give it 5-10 minutes
and take it out again. It should be nearly cold but still pliable. Either fold
it onto itself so you get a thick layer which you can cut in small squares; or
just take it out and roll it into a sausage shape and then cut some slices.
Please be aware when you handle it at this stages your hands will get buttery.
Since you don’t want visible layers you need to handle the dough a bit, but you
also need to work fast, you don’t want to remove too much of the butter.
Put it back
in the fridge and let it cool completely. You then can either cover it with melted
chocolate or eat it as it is. If it is too hard for you when you take it out
from the fridge, just leave it outside for a minute or two and it will get
soft.
The above
picture is one (chocolate covered) caramel with vanilla and the other with Baileys.
You can see how smooth they are, not gritty bits.
Two tips:
Do prepare
the buttered tin before and put the kettle on. After you have put the caramel
into the fridge you want to clean the cooking mug immediately. Best to put
boiling water in and get the rest out like this.
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