Recipe for Chocolate-coated Almond Toffee

[Darienne]

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.

[Kerry Beal]

I don't know the answer to this one - I suspect you could try a double batch to start. Have lots of tricks ready for when it separates.

[minas6907]

I'm pretty sure you should be able to double or triple the recipe no problem. In Chocolates and Confections, I'm pretty sure thats why there are the percentages included, you should be able to make a very large batch no problem, the only thing that is going to change is the cooking time, but that may not be such a huge factor if your using a bigger bowl and a bigger burner anyways. Your still cooking to a temperature, which means the same amount of water would have evaporated, no matter how large or small the batch.

[Chocolot]

you can certainly more than double or triple. I use 12# salted butter, 12# sugar, 3 cups water. Heat the water and butter in the copper kettle. Add the sugar and stir in to mix. Cook over medium flame until all the sugar has dissolved and you can't feel or hear it. Turn up the heat to med-high and keep stirring. Without rings for her stove, it might sit too close to the flame. Might have to adjust your flame. If it is going to separate, it will do it at about 250F. If it does, just add a cup or two of water and keep stirring and cooking. The temp will drop, but will raise again. The copper kettle will invert some of the sugar and actually be a help to your toffee. Don't undercook it. Cook it to at least 310F before pouring out. You need to have a large enough place to pour the batch. If she has a water-cooled table that is ideal, or pour into sheet pans. I use 6 full sheet pans covered in roasted, chopped almonds. Pour over nuts, and spread to cover nuts. When toffee cools to about 150F, sprinkle with dark callets, and wait for them to melt. You don't want tempered chocolate on toffee. It will lift off the smooth surface. If you use untempered chocolate, it will bloom, hence adding nuts on top of your chocolate. After all the chocolate has melted, I put on a new disposable glove and smear the chocolate all over the toffee. Then cover with finer chopped almonds and sprinkle with fleur de Sel salt. Wait for it to cool completely and the chocolate to set. Break up and package. Good luck:-)

[minas6907]

That sounds delicious

[Darienne]

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

[tikidoc]

I posted mine in the recipes section recently at I have successfully doubled but have not tried more than that. SHould be fine as long as you keep stirring. I have never had an issue with it separating. Mine is similar (although a smaller batch) to chocolate's, except the slivered almonds go in the syrup as it cooks. I just use blanched almonds. I cook to 315F. Using chips or chopped chocolate makes spreading the chocolate easy, you just sprinkle the chocolate over the hot toffee, wait a minute for it to melt, then spread with an offset spatula.

[pastrygirl]

In my experience, the biggest problem with multiplying candy recipes is not having a big enough burner for the pot. If the burner is too small or the pot is too large you don't get even heat, and some candies don't work - I'm thinking of pate de fruits that gets weird if it doesn't all boil rapidly enough, and caramelizing sugar and getting crystallization around the edges even though it seems to be boiling in the middle. So the candy burner and copper pot set-up should be ideal for a larger batch. Let us know how it turns out.

[Darienne]

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

[Darienne]

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.

[Kerry Beal]

Darianne - Savage Bros still makes equipment and should be able to answer any questions you have about the burner.

[Chocolot]

That stove is not that old. I see she has at least one ring. Would suggest she use it to raise the kettle a bit from the flame. You go by the look of the flame and the way the batch is looking, rather than a temperature setting. If you would have poured into sheet pans, you could control the temperature of the finished product better. That size kettle could easily handle a 25# batch. Question is could you two lift it:-) After pouring onto the marble, you can run an offset spatulas under the batch, releasing it from the marble. If she is always planning to turn it over, would suggest pouring into sheet pans, and turning the whole pan/batch over onto another pan. Parchment works better than buttering, in my experience. Glad it all worked for you.

[Darienne]

Darianne - Savage Bros still makes equipment and should be able to answer any questions you have about the burner.

Gotcha. Thanks.

[Darienne]

That stove is not that old. I see she has at least one ring. Would suggest she use it to raise the kettle a bit from the flame. You go by the look of the flame and the way the batch is looking, rather than a temperature setting. If you would have poured into sheet pans, you could control the temperature of the finished product better. That size kettle could easily handle a 25# batch. Question is could you two lift it:-) After pouring onto the marble, you can run an offset spatulas under the batch, releasing it from the marble. If she is always planning to turn it over, would suggest pouring into sheet pans, and turning the whole pan/batch over onto another pan. Parchment works better than buttering, in my experience. Glad it all worked for you.

Hi Ruth, Thanks so much for your very practical advice. Besides monitoring this topic now, my friend is planning to join eGullet very soon. Well, probably after Christmas. She, like everyone else is over committed and busy now.

You are so correct about the sheet pans. And the ring. We were both having such a learning experience yesterday. And I have no idea how one person could life that kettle with a heavier load. I believe my friend said it weighs #16 empty. And with boiling hot sugar...oh boy!