Peanut Caramel?

[tarko]

hi

has anybody tried making a peanut caramel? i thought of making a regular caramel, but substituting the butter for peanutbutter? any thoughts?

[Kim Shook]

I really hope that you get an answer to this. Peanut caramel !

[Lisa Shock]

I haven't done it, but, I know that you'd have to be careful about temperatures because the peanuts in peanut butter are already toasted and would be more likely to burn if it gets too hot.

[Tri2Cook]

I can't say that I've ever tried just putting peanut butter in a caramel but I don't see why it wouldn't work. I think I'd incorporate it at a later stage when the caramel was still warm but not hot just to avoid risking the oil seperating out but I'm not even sure that that's necessary. My grandmother used to make peanut butter fudge by cooking sugar, milk, butter and salt to soft ball then stirring in vanilla and peanut butter. Caramelize the sugar first and replace the milk with cream and it would pretty much be the same thing as you want to do.

[ScottyBoy]

Interesting. I put caramel on my signature desert and then sprinkle peanut butter powder on top. If I remember I'll try a little batch with the peanut butter straight in (I make caramel every few days).

[pastrygirl]

Do you mean a chewy caramel candy? Consider that peanut butter is approximately half peanut solids, so it won't be a 1:1 substitution for butter in terms of fat content, and also that the peanut oil is not solid at room temperature like butter is, so that may affect the texture.

[gap]

I think I'd incorporate it at a later stage when the caramel was still warm but not hot just to avoid risking the oil seperating out

I was thinking of a similar issue but adding an emulsifier to stop the separation

[lebowits]

I make a hard crack caramel to which I add a bit of peanut butter right at the end before pouring it out in a thin slab. I suspect that this technique could also be used to make a softer slab of milk/butter caramel. The peanut butter would simply be a flavoring agent. When I make a caramel for enrobing, the final temp is about 243F which shouldn't burn the peanut butter.

You'll just have to calibrate the amount of peanut butter to add according to your taste. If you're worried about the oil separating out, add a touch of liquid lecithin to the the pot while cooking the caramel. That should help keep everything in emulsion.

[Eat.Choui]

This is a very, very "un-technical" recipe. I would make this peanut butter rice crispy recipe:

1 cup sugar

1 cup light corn syrup

1 1/2 cups creamy peanut butter

4 cup rice crispies

Combine sugar and corn syrup. Bring to a boil and let boil for about a minute. Then take off heat and stir in peanut butter. Then pour over rice crispy treats.

But I would have leftover peanut butter mixture. This leftover mixture gets poured on to parchment a left to cool and i would wrap them up in parchment squares like I would for caramels. It's good and chewy and peanut buttery, but very sweet.

Maybe you can start off with this recipe minus the crispies and refine it even more?