Darienne

Will use silicone or parchment next time. They were not incredibly crumbly because I had to work so hard to get them free from the pan and they stayed together pretty much. Peanut butter was "less than 1% salt" on the label and DH always drains off the oil and then adds chopped dry roasted peanuts to the mix. I thought the peanuts by themselves were not very nice and they were salty. Personal taste only. I'll cut down on the sugar very much and top them with chocolate. Sort of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups which I had hoped to do first time. Thanks for the reply.

One huge fairly successful batch of Chocolate coated toffee made today. It's a long and complicated story. And much was learned. My friend works with a huge copper pot on a very old stove. Information on this stove would be appreciated. Made by Savage Bros, Chicago, Economy #20. A dial with no numbers, simply marked in quarters. The butter did NOT separate (thanks to Ruth, Anita, and others for excellent information). However, before I knew it, the cooking process was finished and her electronic thermometer was letting us know with a high-pitched skreel that the top temperature had been reached. Level of heat? Only a smidge past 'on'. Nowhere near even 1/4. Nothing was burning. Why had it taken such a short time? Then my friend poured it out on her buttered marble table. The thick marble top was SO cold that the toffee set up within only a couple of seconds and could not be spread properly. She didn't know and I certainly didn't know. Next time, she'll pour it out with a different spread which will help. I've never seen toffee set up so quickly;. Not in my home kitchen for certain. So some was thin and some was thick...etc. Next problem involved a fear that we would not be able to get the toffee off the table. My friend had had a dreadful experience with a sticking brittle. So we worked at freeing the toffee which broke very unevenly: large pieces, tiny chips...it was a job. Then the chocolate set up so quickly on side #1 that we had to work together like fiends trying to get the finely-chopped nuts on before the chocolate refused to receive them. Of course we were working on pieces of toffee, not a solid slab. Chocolate on side #2 was much slower to set up and so adding the nuts was not so frantic. Folks came in and out of the store as we were working in the front window (now that's a novel experience) and many samples in various states of finished-ness were handed out. I know polite and I know rabid enthusiasm, and this was the second. What's not to love? The finished product, almost 7 pounds, my friend generously donated, to the Christmas gifts which I volunteered to make for the volunteers of the local humane society (this leaves me only 8 pounds of brittle to make). I'll add her logo and address to my logo sticker on the box top. It will be a good introduction locally to my friend's products. This is going to be a winner for my friend. The process needs some tweaking and some new bits and bobs purchased to make it all run more smoothly, and soon toffee will be added to her excellent fudge, brittle and chocolate- and caramel-dipped pretzel rods. I returned to home base loaded with toffee for my project.

Great idea. Fortunately I have been so swamped with other things that I didn't have a chance to separate the pieces and throw the leathery bits out yet. The steaming will wait a while before being tried. In the meantime, they were rolled in sugar and put into an air-tight container. And oh my! the smell and taste of the syrup is just fantastic! Thanks again, Andie

Just made the cookies. The recipes call for ungreased pans and then they were so hard to get off the pan. What did I do wrong? If I make them again, I'll bake the cookies on silicone mats. Also cut down on the sugar (and this was with unsweetened peanut butter.) I was originally intending to dip them or top them with dark chocolate, but just found the cookies so sweet that it didn't seem like a good idea anymore. Anyone else have sticking problems?

The Buddha's Hand event is done. I decided to go with DL's candying of the fruit, Candied Citron[/url and then next I'll use the resulting syrup...luscious...and candied bits in other things. Interesting process. Blanched the tiny pieces, then candied them. They took forever. I kept checking on them over and over and guess what? The last time out of the kitchen, I pretty much forgot about them (it was late and I was tired) and when I suddenly smelled that 'oh, oh' smell, it was too late for perfection. The syrup was still fine. But the pieces with rind on them had that leathery texture. The rind-less pieces are fine. Next step? Haven't decided yet. My only photo. Blanched but not yet overcooked.

OK. Don't despise me for being lazy and taking the easy way out. I have agreed to make Christmas gifts for the local Humane Society staff to hand out to their volunteers. Thirty to be exact. Half-pound boxes of Nut Brittle. Fifteen pounds. By next Friday. Along with the rest of my chaotic life. Like teaching a professional fudge maker how to make Enstrom type toffee at 11 today. (Just finished making several dozen lollipops for their Dog Adoption Day today.) I have a new recipe from a class I took last month: New Delhi Fragrant Indian Brittle which calls for honey and cardamom. And I have an old Microwave Peanut Brittle Recipe and a brand new 1000 watt microwave and some questions. 1. My microwave is BRAND NEW and 1000 watts. This is an old recipe. I think I ought to use Power level 8. My first batch of lollipops I did at top power and they were slightly burned. The rest I did at 9. But I feel I could have gone to 8. 2. My 'fancy' recipe calls for cardamom. I am thinking about when to add it. With the nuts? That is still cooked in, but not risking burning? 53 The 'fancy' recipe calls for 1/4 cup corn syrup & 1/4 cup HONEY. The old recipe calls for 1/2 cup corn syrup only. What do you think? Well, I can try it with the honey and see if it works. Seems like the probable answer. Any advice is welcomed. Thanks.

Thank you. I will be back. One way or t'other.

Got it: blender, juicer, microplane with handle and chopper. And the Homesick Texan purchased in Terre Haute, IN, on the road out west. Not got it: the gas stove. Be realistic, girl. Next spring if you are lucky. Next: a bunch of wanted cookbooks from Amazon.com, a food mill (my non-cooking friend took hers back...rats), tortilla warmer, BlenderBottle (amazing toy). That's it for now.

Thanks all for the help. I particularly like the idea of the disposable glove to spread the chocolate. Never thought of that.

The fact that the 2nd hand pieces are often quite old is all to the advantage. Often the pieces are made out of...now wait for it...you can remember it...METAL. Like our very old sandwich and waffle grill. You can buy decent Pyrex with all the original ingredients in it...often quite dirty, but I can wash it up very well. The pots and pans can be from Korea or even Japan if you can find them that old. And then there is the cry of discovery!!!

There are lots of excellent recipes in eGullet and online for making English style/Buttercrunch/etc Toffee, coated on both sides with chocolate (tempered or not) and sprinkled with finely chopped nuts. eG's Kerry Beal has a really good one in Confectionery 101. I need to know if this recipe, or ones like it...I use a copycat Enstrom toffee recipe with basically the same ratios of sugar and butter...can be doubled or even tripled. Obviously a manufacturer like Enstrom makes huge batches at once, but perhaps this is one of those kinds of recipes which can't just be doubled or tripled holus bolus. I have foolishly agreed to help a friend and local professional fudge maker learn to make this kind of toffee. This Saturday. Morning. THEN she told me that she had a huge professional stove with huge copper kettles and needed to at least double the recipe for such a big pot. You can't put a normal sized pot...say 2 - 4 litres...on her stove. It has no rings. I haven't seen it and don't really know exactly what to expect. Carrying on...each batch she has attempted so far has been a failure in that the butter separated. We can come back to our place to try a simple one batch recipe if the big one fails again...or if someone, like Chocolot or Kerry Beal, tells me...no it doesn't work that way. You need a specially formulated recipe. Help Thanks.

Uniformity is highly over-rated. Those look enticing and delicious.

Gotta make some of this thing.

The Humane Society in Moab is one of my favorites to help. Besides making lollipops for these weekend's Dog Adoption Day, I have also offered to make 30...30? what was I thinking?...boxes of something for their volunteers. What to make? Chocolate-coated toffee is just a tad too expensive to make. And 1/4 pound boxes might seem a bit ungenerous. What should I make in 1/2 pound boxes which will not strain the bank account? I've never made Caramel Corn (Jaymes' recipe). And could it pack into 1/2 pound boxes? Or would I be better buying 'seasonal' plastic bags? A nut/seed brittle? Not fudge. Haven't made fudge in decades. Truffles are too much work. Caramels just a bit iffy. They can end up sticky (well, for me every now and then.) Plus I am cooking at 4000 feet and that's not my usual sea level. Plus, plus, plus. Seasoned nuts are easy but I think too expensive...haven't priced them out. Speaking of 'giving'. This Saturday I am to teach a newly professional candymaker how to make the Enstrom toffee. Hers always separates or something else. O the folly of my teaching this. Her parents were candymakers back in the small regional candymaking times and right now she is whipping off fudge as a pro. All paws crossed for this one. Please some help with my donation problem!!! Thanks.

Ojisan, you must be prescient. The very thing I was going to ask, although I thinking of Poblanos.

Hi Jaymes, Of course you would know the recipes. You could write your own book. And I do use some of your recipes already. I should have added that I did add to the Tomato Cobbler recipe. Added a sprinkle of cheese on top and Ed suggested adding black beans and rajas to the mix. Maybe corn. Tex-Mex a la Ontario.

I'm not from Texas and have actually eaten very little in Texas over the years. Sad to admit, Texas is basically on the southern route from Ontario to Utah for us. (Don't hate me because I am an ignorant Canadian. ) We stopped in Terre Haute, IN, for a decent cup of coffee at the local bookstore and I decided to buy one cookbook to read both to myself and out loud to my DH on our current trip and it was the The Homesick Texan by Lisa Fain. I have been following her blog for some time now and had decided to get the second book but the store had only the first. Bought it. Read extensively from it. Going to get the second book also. I had already made a strawberry ice cream from Fain's blog and now have made Tex-Mex Meat Loaf with Chipotle-Tomato Glaze and the Tomato Cobbler. Both were great successes. The photo was not. While in Moab, UT, where you can't buy the more 'Mexican' ingredients anyway, I think I'll make a lot more of her recipes. Can't buy those ingredients back home in the far frozen north either. Well, like achiote paste, epazote, traditional chorizo, all the cheeses, etc. Anyone else cook from this book?

At $10 a pop, I wouldn't be buying them too often, you can be sure. But then they never make their way up to the far frozen north into our nearby provincial type city (Don't tell anyone I said the part about provincial ) As for BH short-breads...I take it you mean just add some BH zest? I have downloaded three different recipes from the web to look at more carefully today: DL, Chef Eddy...both for candying and Dessert First (Pastry Girl) for BH Ginger Cake. Shall report back anon. Thanks for the idea. I can probably do all four in the end.

I freeze the extra. DL's Vietnamese Ice Cream works out to 1 1/2 cans of condensed milk. So the rest of it goes into the freezer. Problem solves (for me).

Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Thank you so much. A terrific explanation for those problems which have occurred to probably every brittle/toffee maker. And so timely for me. (And others.) Thanks, Lisa

I know you all know what a Buddha's Hand looks like. Heck, Heidhi even has a tree in her neighborhood, but here is another photo. This Buddha's Hand is a particular one because it is MINE! MINE! I bought it a couple of days ago in Albuquerque at a Whole Foods and I was just thrilled to pieces to finally own one. What I will do with it I have no idea yet, but I do have this photo record of MY very own Buddha's Hand for posterity. And yes, it smells lovely and I smell it each time I pass it in our rental condo kitchen.

I like to make Viennese Crescents from Fanny Farmer for Christmas using ground pecans instead of almonds. I make them in extended ovals instead of crescents and drizzle dark chocolate on their tops in a rounded zig-zag pattern. These go to a Christmas Eve party along with DH's French Canadian Tortiere. Also a favorite...and I have a couple of 'commissions' to make it for a local business...is the Copy Cat Enstrom's Style Toffee.

This sounds like something I must make. Almost everything tastes delicious dipped into chocolate. Or coated. Or topped with. Or rolled in. Or...

Even better if you can get them at the dollar store! A funny thing which often happens when you give out goodies in a fancy tin, is that you get them back again. A sort of 'if I give it back to you then maybe you will fill it again.' A friend of mine makes delectable Christmas cakes, baking right in the little Dollarama round tins. I always give the tin back after Christmas. Hint. Hint.

Just curious: What does this mean? What was the "chocolate" then? Seriously I don't really know. It was in exactly the same format as Baker's Unsweetened chocolate but I've never noticed it in a grocery store so I can't say what it was. Sort of a compound chocolate I suppose but not as bad as the dreaded Merken's Chocolate Melting Wafers.