Category Archives: My Favorites

Rolo Pretzel Turtles

Posted on April 14, 2010 by Veronica

You can find this recipe all over the internet, but I got mine from Laura, The Cooking Photographer. Since she posted the recipe last May, I’ve made them at least a dozen times because I give a lot of food gifts and these are so easy to make that they’re perfect when I forget a birthday and have to make something at the last minute. They are also one of the most well-received food gifts I make. And of everything I’ve ever made in my life, I think these little beauties have caused me the most overall weight gain. So I’m really not sure whether or not to thank Laura or whether or not I’m doing you a favor by sharing the recipe with you.

These are heavily addicting and I’ve finally learned to make only as many as I want to give, and NOT use the whole bag of Rolos because then I will inevitably eat half the batch. (And in the case of the second to last batch I made….I ate the entire batch. Every single one. Yes, that was about fifty Rolo Turtles!) I love the salty pretzel flavor combined with the sweet chocolate and sticky caramel and the contrasting nutty crunch from the pecans. They are really easy to make but oh-so-delicious.

Laura gives many ideas for toppings (including any variety of M&Ms, peanuts & chocolate covered coffee beans) and after trying them all (plus almonds, cashews & brazil nuts), I have to say I still prefer the toasted pecans. If you’re making these for children, I’m sure they would love the splash of color from M&Ms and you could also use holiday M&Ms to make these for Independence Day, Halloween, Christmas, Valentines Day, Saint Patrick’s Day, Easter, or any other holiday party.

If you decide to try them, don’t try to say I didn’t warn you. You will gain at least one pant size.

Rolo Pretzel Turtles
Printable Recipe
Printable recipe with picture

Rolos
Mini pretzels (regular or square)
Toasted pecans

Preheat oven to 220 degrees. Line a cookie sheet with foil. Place the pretzels on the cookie sheet and top with one Rolo each. Bake for three minutes. Remove from the oven and press on topping of choice. Then slide the foil onto the counter and let the chocolate set up. For faster set up, you can move the pan with the candy to the freezer, and chill for about 20 minutes or until firm.

Notes: To toast pecans, spread them out on a plate and microwave for 30 seconds at a time. Stir the pecans around with your hand in between cooking times until toasted.

Veronica’s Notes: To package these for gifts, I wrap them in foil candy wrappers (can be found at hobby stores, cake supply stores and Wal-Mart) or pieces of waxed paper and put in cello bags, tying the tops with raffia or curling ribbon. They could also be given in tins.

Recipe source: slightly adapted from The Cooking Photographer

34 Comments

Posted in Candy, My Favorites and tagged pretzels, rolo pretzel turtles, rolos, turtles. Bookmark the permalink.

Creamy Chicken Enchiladas

Posted on March 20, 2010 by Veronica

Although my confidence in baking is pretty high, I have very little confidence as a chef. (I’m sure that’s obvious from the amount of sweet vs. savory recipes I post!) Countless times, I have relied on this simple recipe, one I developed over time from another given to me by a friend, to fall back on when I wanted to serve something that wouldn’t disappoint. I can always count on it–it never fails me. Mother’s Day potluck? Bringing these enchiladas. Family reunion? Bringing these enchiladas. Friend coming from out-of-town? Serving these enchiladas. Providing food for the grief-stricken survivors of a lost loved one? It’s gonna be these enchiladas. Preacher and his wife coming to dinner? Definitely serving these enchiladas.

These aren’t just my favorite enchiladas, this are my favorite dish, period. It might not top your list of favorites, but I do know that everyone I serve them to really enjoys them as well. Dinner guests don’t always do the eye roll and moan that I usually do with the first bite, but they always give rave reviews.

Although I tend to think of anything that contains “cream of fill in the blank soup” as ghetto food and try to avoid it, I’ve tried leaving it out and subbing more sour cream but it really does taste best with the stupid soup.

Two tips to get the best flavor: shred your own cheese instead of buying pre-shredded and be sure to buy PACE brand picante sauce. Here’s why. Pre-shredded cheese is coated with some sort of junk* to keep it from clumping together in the bag, but it also inhibits the beautiful gooey melt we desire. It will melt, but not as well as cheese you shred yourself (see photo below of pre-shredded cheese-topped enchiladas compared to first photo for proof). I was also astonished to discover that shredding your own combination of cheddar and Monterrey Jack tastes ten times better than using the Mexican cheese blend. Strange, but true. As for the picante sauce, this is probably the only time I’ll ever insist on not going generic (I’m the Queen of Generic, FYI) but the flavor of the sauce really enhances the enchiladas and generic just really isn’t as good here. I don’t even know if it would be as good with some fancy-schmancy expensive stuff but since I haven’t tried it, I won’t forbid it. If you go for the fancy schmancy, let me know how it worked for you!

OK, enough talk. On your mark, get set, go make these enchiladas!

CREAMY CHICKEN ENCHILADAS
Makes 15 enchiladas

Printable recipe

2 cups cooked & shredded chicken breast meat
1 cup chopped onion
1 cup sour cream
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 (7-oz) can chopped green chiles
4 cups shredded Mexican cheese blend OR 2 cups Monterrey Jack & 2 cups Cheddar, divided
1/2 cup Pace Picante Sauce (use original in your choice of heat)
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
Salt & Pepper to taste
15 flour tortillas (soft-taco size)
2 (10 oz) cans enchilada sauce (AKA red sauce)
Butter for pans and tortillas

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 13×9 and a 9×9 pan with butter and set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine the chicken, onion, sour cream, soup, green chiles, 2 1/2 cups of the cheese (reserve the rest for the top), salsa, garlic, salt & pepper.

Heat the tortillas in stacks of six by wrapping them in a damp paper towel and microwaving for 50 seconds. Rub a stick of cold butter over one side of each tortilla while they’re hot, turn them over, and begin filling them. Use about 1/3 cup per tortilla. Place seam-side down in pans. Once assembled, pour the enchilada sauce evenly over them (I use a pastry brush to get it evenly spread), cover the pans with foil and bake in for 30 minutes. Remove foil, sprinkle the cheese over the top and return to the oven for 10 minutes or until cheese is melted. Remove from oven and let sit for a few minutes before serving (they’re easier to move from pan to plate after sitting a little bit).

If you are making them in advance, assemble them in your pans but don’t put on the sauce. Keep in the fridge covered with plastic wrap. When ready to bake, cover them with sauce, swap the plastic wrap for foil and bake for 40 minutes, then uncover and top with cheese before returning it to the oven for an additional 10. These can definitely be frozen but since but I haven’t tried it yet, this is just my theory on how that should be done: after filling the pan with rolled enchiladas, go ahead and pour the sauce on top and sprinkle on the cheese. Cover and freeze. You could probably bake them from frozen, but you’d have to bake them at least an hour, covered, and an additional 10 uncovered. You could also defrost them in the fridge for a couple days before baking, then bake covered for 40 minutes and uncovered for 10.

Believe me, it tastes better than it looks!

*I learned this from Mel at My Kitchen Cafe, whose husband works at a cheese factory. Ever since she mentioned this in one of her blogs (can’t remember which), I’ve shredded my own cheese and haven’t looked back. It really is worth the extra minute or two it tacks onto the preparation. If you’ve never been to her blog–check it out and browse around. Hers is my favorite food blog and I make more dishes from it than any other. Family friendly, comfort, down-home cookin’ dishes is what she offers and that’s what I’m comfortable with & enjoy eating most.

*Veronica’s Note: I almost always serve these enchiladas with green rice, another tried-and-true recipe that I’ve been making longer than the enchiladas and it always gets as many compliments. If you want that recipe, click here.

20 Comments

Posted in Main Dishes, Mexican, My Favorites. Bookmark the permalink.

Fluffy Buttermilk Pancakes

Posted on March 4, 2010 by Veronica

I’m not sure how the ritual started, but when I was nine and my sister, Danielle, was seven, we would wake up every morning at five to make buttermilk pancakes from scratch for Dad’s breakfast (he was the early riser since he had to be to work by seven). We were total “Daddy’s girls” and loved to do anything that pleased him, but we especially loved to make him buttermilk pancakes because we also got to reap the delicious rewards of our efforts.

Before Dad’s alarm went off, we’d tiptoe down the stairs and together we’d measure the ingredients for the pancakes into a big bowl and then carefully pour spoonfuls onto a special plug-in pancake griddle that we cooked eight small pancakes on at a time. While they cooked, we’d nibble on the edges and once the first ones were done, we nibbled on those. I loved those pancakes probably more than anything else I ate growing up because it was the closest thing to junk food that was regularly allowed to be produced in my Mom’s kitchen. A product with dairy, white flour and white sugar was unheard of in our house and it still kind of surprises me today that she allowed us to do it. Then again, she was probably just grateful that she wasn’t the one waking up at five to make breakfast! :)

By the time Dad came down from his bath in his mailman uniform, smelling like Old Spice, we had a big plate full of pancakes and coffee ready, and if we were really on the ball we’d have scrambled eggs cooked up too. I still can smell the combination of pancakes, butter, coffee and Old Spice surrounding me as we sat down with Dad and gleefully tore into the butter and syrup-laden pancakes, trying to keep our voices down while Mom and our little sister, Lacey, slept peacefully upstairs.

Eventually the thrill of eating those “forbidden fruit” pancakes wore off and was no longer enough of an incentive to get us out of bed before dawn. The daily ritual eventually diminished to once a week and then once a month, but it lasted for years. By the time I was in high school, pancakes were a special Sunday breakfast that we only indulged in a few times a year and I haven’t seen that old stained buttermilk pancakes recipe that we cut out from the back of a flour sack since I left home over a decade ago.

That recipe somehow got lost without me there to use it, however infrequently, and I was left slightly unsatisfied with the pancakes I’ve made since then. Well, the “Best Buttermilk Pancakes” were really good, but not fluffy like my favorite childhood pancakes. These pancakes are the closest thing I’ve had to those I made growing up since I’ve left home–wonderfully soft and fluffy with just a hint of sweetness.

Maybe it’s because I never had real maple syrup growing up (shocking, since Mom mainly stocked unrefined sugars such as honey and molasses–maybe real maple syrup was just not in our food budget), but I prefer these pancakes with Aunt Jemima. (They are pictured with real maple syrup, which is why it’s soaking in rather than sitting on the surface.)

Fluffy Buttermilk Pancakes

Printable recipe
Printable recipe with picture

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups well shaken buttermilk
2 large eggs
1/4 cup vegetable oil (plus extra for skillet)

Mix dry ingredients together in medium bowl. Add all wet ingredients at once and stir just until combined. Do not over mix, batter will be slightly lumpy. Lightly coat skillet with oil. Heat to medium low. Drop 1/8 cup of batter onto heated skillet. Cook on first side until bubbles begin to form on surface, 2-3 minutes. Flip over and cook another 2-3 minutes until golden brown and centre springs back when lightly touched. Serve warm with maple syrup and butter. Makes 10-12 pancakes.

Recipe source: Radishes and Rhubarb

Most of the pictures taken of us growing up remain at my parents’ house, but I thought I’d include a few that I do have here.

Dad and I in 1980

Already a Daddy’s girl!

Danielle, Franciska (aka Lacey) and Me on the fold-out couch we slept on until we moved into a bigger house a few years later.

Danielle, me and Lacey at a baby shower. My Mom made the cake on the left. Danielle and I were a little younger than this when we started making the pancake breakfasts.

47 Comments

Posted in Breakfast, My Favorites and tagged fluffy buttermilk pancakes. Bookmark the permalink.

World’s Greatest Salmon (improved)

Posted on March 1, 2010 by Veronica

Yes, I know the title is a bold statement, but that is how much I love this salmon. I’m willing to admit there may be better recipes, but I honestly have never had better salmon, no many how many variations I try. This is my favorite and it may be presumptuous to call it “world’s greatest” simply because I love it, but this is my blog and I think it’s the best, so there! :)

This is actually the first recipe I ever posted, back when I was just a MySpace blogger. I actually started Veronica’s Cornucopia in the fall of ’09 but if you do much searching, you’ll see I have recipes dating back to June of 2008 because I copied all those I had on MySpace over to here when I started it. And this one was the very first. But I like it so, so much, and have improved it since the original post, so it merits an encore.

Enjoy!

World’s Greatest Salmon
adapted from my friend Rossie K’s recipe
Serves 6

6 (4-oz) salmon fillets
4 large garlic cloves, minced
1/2 cup REAL maple syrup
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/4 teaspoon sesame oil
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 green pepper, cut into strips
1 red pepper, cut into strips
1 yellow pepper, cut into strips
1 onion, sliced into rings
1/4 teaspoon cornstarch

Put the minced garlic, maple syrup and soy sauce in a gallon-size Ziploc bag, seal it, and shake it to combine. Add the filets and reseal, then place the bag in the fridge for at least two hours, turning halfway through.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees and spray a 9×13 baking dish with cooking spray. Arrange the salmon filets in a single layer in the dish and pour about a tablespoon of marinade over each filet. Bake for 10-15 minutes, or until the fish flakes easily when pierced with a fork.

Meanwhile, heat the sesame and vegetable oil in a large skillet. Add the peppers and onion, stir, and pour the remaining marinade over everything. Saute on medium-high until the vegetables are tender and the sauce has reduced. If the sauce is too thin, add the cornstarch and cook another minute or two until it has thickened, adding additional cornstarch if necessary.

To serve, plate a salmon filet and spoon some of the vegetables and sauce over the top. Serve hot!

Veronica’s Notes: This recipe is best with skinless salmon filets. You can replace the maple syrup with honey if you don’t have any–I haven’t tried it this way because I like the maple version too well to change it, but Rossie made it that way and loved it. You can use any soy sauce you like, but I always use light soy sauce (in this case, the “light” is referring to reduced sodium) because even that has plenty of salt and makes a wonderfully flavored fish.

12 Comments

Posted in Lighter Fare, Main Dishes, Meats, My Favorites and tagged garlic, maple syrup, recipe, salmon, soy sauce, world's greatest salmon. Bookmark the permalink.

Zesty Pizza Sauce

Posted on January 13, 2010 by Veronica

I usually don’t follow pizza recipes because to me, pizza is a thing you kind of just throw together with whatever you happen to have on hand. I do, however, follow a recipe for sauce and it’s always, always this one. It’s my idea of a perfect pizza sauce: thick & zesty and easy to prepare. It’s perfect for any classic combination of meat and/or veggie toppings and the prep is so quick that I always do it just before I need it, usually while the pizza dough is resting, because I always forget to make it in advance.

Zesty Old School Style Pizza Sauce
Recipe from The Cooking Photographer

1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
1 (6 ounce) can tomato paste
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon dried basil
1 teaspoon garlic powder
½ teaspoon onion powder
1 teaspoon ground sweet paprika
1 teaspoon sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
Fresh cracked pepper to taste
2 Tablespoons olive oil*
1 teaspoon white vinegar

Place all the ingredients in a medium sized bowl and stir together.

Makes 1½ cups of pizza sauce, which is enough to cover two large pizzas or three medium.

*I’ve made it with the full 2 T of oil, but lately have begun using just 2 teaspoons. I can’t say I prefer one over the other so if you’re looking to save some calories, you might do the same.

4 Comments

Posted in Condiments & ETC., Italian, My Favorites, Pizza and tagged easy, pizza sauce, quick, zesty. Bookmark the permalink.

Buttermilk Ranch Dressing

Posted on January 11, 2010 by Veronica

This dressing is really stinkin’ good. That’s all I have to say. Except that after taking this photo, I ate this entire plate of veggies (though I detest cucumbers) and almost all of the dressing. It’s really good. Really.

Buttermilk Ranch Dressing
Recipe by Our Best Bites

*note that all spices/herbs listed below are dried. If substituting fresh, use the rule 1 part dry = 3 parts fresh.

1 C mayo
2/3 C buttermilk
1/4 t white vinegar
1 t parsley
1/8 t dill
1/4 t garlic powder
1/4 t onion powder
1 1/2 t dried chives
1/8 t black pepper
1/4 t seasoned salt
1/8 t dry mustard

Beat the mayo and buttermilk until smooth, then stir in the remaining ingredients. Refrigerate at least overnight to allow the flavors to develop.

8 Comments

Posted in Condiments & ETC., My Favorites and tagged buttermilk, dressing, easy, ranch. Bookmark the permalink.

Italian Green Beans

Posted on January 2, 2010 by Veronica

I’m often prone to exaggeration, but I’m telling you the honest-to-goodness truth when I say I eat these green beans a minimum of five times a week. The green beans and olive oil are so healthy and adding in the seasonings just makes them wonderful. I love them so much and they’re so easy to make, I bring them with me every day for lunch! In fact, my green bean infatuation has become a long-standing joke with my co-workers. They used to make bets on whether or not I’d brought the green beans but now they don’t bother. They know that no matter what else I’ve brought, the green beans will accompany it. They watch me heating my food with knowing smiles and slowly shake their heads as I take my seat.

I smile back and eat them in blissful reverence. They wouldn’t mock if they knew what they were missing.

Italian Green Beans

Printable recipe
Printable recipe with picture

1 lb. green beans (fresh, frozen or canned all work)
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 packet Italian dressing mix

Cook/heat the green beans, drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle the dressing mix over the top. Toss together and serve hot. To make an individual serving, I heat a can of green beans (yes, a serving to me is an entire can!), drizzle with a little EVOO and then sprinkle as much dressing mix as I want.

Recipe by Veronica Miller

18 Comments

Posted in Italian, Lighter Fare, My Favorites, Side Dishes, Vegetarian & Vegan and tagged easy, fast, green beans, Italian, recipe. Bookmark the permalink.

Incredible Dinner Rolls (bread machine)

Posted on December 29, 2009 by Veronica

It took countless batches of dinner roll failures over the course of two years to finally perfect a recipe to my tastes. This one has everything I love in a dinner roll: soft, light, slightly sweet, and simple to make. They are just incredible, especially when warm and served with butter.

Incredible Dinner Rolls
Printable recipe

1 egg
3 Tablespoon butter
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon salt
4 cups all-purpose flour
¼ cup sugar
2 ¼ teaspoon (1 package) bread machine yeast*

Crack the egg into a Ziploc bag and place it in a bowl of hot tap water, so that it will come quickly to room temperature.

Melt the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat, then stir in the milk and heat the mixture until it reaches 110-115 degrees, or until it feels very warm to the touch.

Squish the egg while it’s inside the bag until it looks lightly beaten. Empty it into the bread machine pan; add the milk mixture, and then top with the remaining ingredients in the order listed. Set the machine to the dough cycle.

When the machine starts to mix the dough faster, check on it and, if necessary, use a spatula to help incorporate the flour. I always have to do this, but that may be because my machine is old and sub-par.

Once the cycle is complete, remove pan and punch down dough. If you’re making 12 large rolls, spray a 9×13 pan with cooking spray. If you’re making 20 standard-size rolls, spray two 9-inch round cake pans.

Divide the dough in half, and then divide each half into 6-10 pieces, depending on the amount you want to make. Shape each piece into a ball as you pull off the dough, and place in pan(s), spacing evenly.

Cover with clean cloth(s) and allow to rise in a warm place for about 30-45 minutes, or until rolls are doubled in size.** Preheat oven to 375 while your dough is rising.

Bake for 15-18 minutes or until golden-brown. When done, remove from oven and rub the end of a cold stick of butter over the tops of the rolls. Serve warm & with lots of butter. :) If making in advance, store them in an airtight container (I always use a gallon-size Ziploc bag) and reheat them in the oven when you’re ready to serve them (be sure to remove them from the bag first!)

*Also marketed as “rapid-rise” and “instant” yeast.
**I most often use my oven for rising bread. I preheat it to its lowest setting (170 degrees) once the dough begins its first rise in the bread machine and turning it off when it’s done preheating, that way it’s warm but not too hot once I place the pans in to rise. That works the best. (If you use this method, you’ll have to remove them after they’re done rising, preheat the oven, and let the rolls rest on the counter until it reaches 375.) If the top of your oven gets warm when you preheat it, you could also set your pans up there. The last trick I use is to place the pan on a heating pad set to low.
***You could also make these by hand or using your stand mixer with dough hooks, letting the dough rise in an oiled bowl for one hour or until doubled after kneading. I don’t know how long you’d have to knead it, though. I’d estimate 10 minutes.

19 Comments

Posted in Bread, My Favorites and tagged bread machine, dinner rolls, incredible, light, soft, sweet. Bookmark the permalink.

Chipotle Honey Roasted Peanuts

Posted on December 6, 2009 by Veronica

These sweet, salty, spicy & smoky nuts are a personal favorite of mine. I have made them many times for parties and as gifts and they are always a huge hit. I’m currently making batches to include in Christmas gift baskets because there are so many cookies & sweets being given this time of year, and something with savory notes can be a relief from the monotony.

And I should add that a friend I shared this recipe with insists that it must be tried with almonds and walnuts as well. She says, “they are just amazing!”

Chipotle Honey Roasted Peanuts

from allrecipes.com

1/3 cup white sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons chipotle chile powder
1/4 teaspoon chili powder
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons honey
1 teaspoon kosher salt (I used table salt)
1 pound skinless peanuts

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Stir together the sugar, chipotle powder, chili powder, and garlic powder in a small bowl; set aside.

Stir together the butter, honey, and kosher salt in a large saucepan over medium heat until the butter has melted, and the mixture is bubbly. Stir in the peanuts until well coated, then pour out into a 9×13 inch baking dish.

Bake in preheated oven until the nuts are golden brown, about 30 minutes. Stir the mixture 2 or 3 times to ensure even cooking. Once done, scrape the peanuts into a large metal bowl, and sprinkle with the spice mixture. Toss the peanuts to evenly coat with the spice mixture. Allow the peanuts to cool to room temperature, tossing every few minutes so the nuts do not stick together.

*Veronica’s notes: I use unsalted roasted peanuts, which initially caused me a bit of worry as I thought they’d be over-roasted after baking for 30 minutes, but nope, they were just perfect. I have also used salted, roasted nuts and omitted the salt from the recipe. If you’re giving them as a gift, here’s an idea on how to package it–just buy a jar or plastic container of nuts, save it, and put the nuts back in when they’re done (wait till they cool). The coating bulks their size so you’ll have plenty left over for yourself. :) Then just rip off the old label and make your own custom label. A cellophanE bag with a festive bow would make an attractive presentation as well, and you could get 2-3 bags out of each recipe, depending on the size of your bag.

7 Comments

Posted in My Favorites, Snacks & Appetizers and tagged chipotle, honey roasted, peanuts. Bookmark the permalink.

Soft Caramels

Posted on December 4, 2009 by Veronica

Something has come over me. For the past two days, I haven’t been able to sleep until two in the morning and during the day, I’ve been so tired that it literally feels like my eyes are going to fall out of their sockets.

The reason? Caramels. Cararmels have turned me into a zombie woman. They’ve completely taken over my life and I can get no rest!

Two days ago I got the brilliant idea to finally give homemade caramels a go. I was pleasantly surprised at how simple they were to prepare. They weren’t, however, easy to remove from the pan, and so I stayed up until two in the morning scraping each square from the pan and wrapping them in waxed paper. And eating every other one.

I have to say, store-bought caramels can’t hold a candle to homemade. Homemade is soft, gooey, buttery, caramelly deliciousness. They are so delicious that I couldn’t resist making another batch the following day. After all, I made the first batch for gifts and now I needed more for an upcoming Christmas party. (Not for myself…of course not.) And besides, I needed to figure out a way to keep the caramels from sticking to the pan and what better way than trial and error?

So I made a second batch, lining the pan with waxed paper and spraying it with oil. And I stayed up until two in the morning the second day in a row, scraping each piece off the waxed paper, then dipping them in chocolate (because party caramels should be pretty and irresistable).

And they were. Irresistable. I ate every other one. Again.

Obviously I also encountered a problem with photography as well. I absolutely could not stop shooting photos of these beautiful things. After shooting picture after picture, I eventually ran to the garage and got out Christmas decorations (I’ve been too busy making caramels to decorate with them yet) to use for props. All told, I took well over 100 pictures of them. I’m not even kidding. Then it took me almost an hour to narrow down the ones I wanted to keep to the myriad I’m posting here.

And now it’s nearly one in the morning, and what am I doing? Staying up so I can tell everyone about these fabulous things. Like I said, they’ve taken over my life. And I suppose I’ve happily relinquished control!

As for the problem with the caramel sticking to the pan, I now know you have to very generous with the butter. I should have consulted my friend, Teri, before I made the caramels, since I knew she makes them every year at this time. Ah well, now I have an excuse to make another batch. You know, just to see if it works.

Soft Caramels

Printable recipe
Printable recipe with picture

1 pound brown sugar
1 cup corn syrup
1 cup (2 sticks) butter
1 (14-oz) can sweetened condensed milk

Put all the ingredients in a large saucepan (my 3-quart was the perfect size–don’t go any smaller) and bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium and continue to boil, stirring constantly, for ten minutes. Set the timer as soon as it begins to bubble and take the pan off as soon as it goes off. Pour caramel into a buttered 9×13 pan and let cool completely before cutting & wrapping in squares of waxed paper.

Tips for success

*If you have a candy thermometer, it wouldn’t hurt to attach it to the pan to make sure the caramel is at 245 degrees F when you remove it from the heat. My first batch was actually at 240 when I removed it and it still turned out fine, but my second batch reached 245 in nine minutes so I removed it early and it was the same texture as the first batch.

*You can stir in a teaspoon of vanilla after you remove the pan from the heat. I did this the second time but didn’t notice an improvement in flavor. It seemed just as good without the vanilla, so I didn’t include it in the ingredient list.

*When you pour the caramel into the buttered pan, there will be some that clings to the bottom and sides. Don’t scrape this out on top of the pan of caramel like I did on my first batch. Have a small buttered bowl on hand and scrape it into that. This caramel will be harder than the other caramel, because it remained in contact with the heat longer. If you scrape it out, you will have a hard piece among the soft and when you try to cut it, the softer caramel will squish out and it won’t be pretty and perfect. This caramel is totally edible, just a little more chewy, so you can snack on it while rolling your evenly-textured caramels into waxed paper.

*On both batches, I put salted, roasted peanuts on half of the pan. The salty/sweet combo is yummy and kind of reminds me of a PayDay. And when you dip the pieces in chocolate, it’s kind of like a Snickers. Except it’s way better than either because it’s homemade! If you want to add nuts to the whole batch, you can stir them in after removing the pan from the heat. If you only want half the batch with nuts or want two or more types of nuts, dump the caramel into the pan and then sprinkle the nuts over the top. The first batch I tried putting the nuts on half of the bottom and pouring the caramel over, but the nuts got all pushed around and then tons of air bubbles kept rising up and I had to keep popping them so that the surface didn’t look all funkalicious.

*If you’d like to dip the caramels in chocolate, you can either melt chocolate almond bark, an equal amount of chocolate chips with almond bark (this makes the color darker & it tastes better while still setting up nicely) or you can melt chocolate with some shaved paraffin wax. (This makes the chocolate shiny & makes it set up really nicely. You can find it on the baking aisle.) I melted 2 cups of semi-sweet chocolate chips (I think milk chocolate would be even better!) with 1/8 of a block of finely shaved paraffin in the microwave, stirring every 30 seconds until everything was melted and smooth and shiny. Dip the caramels with a fork, tap off the excess and slide them onto a sheet of waxed paper to set. I ground a bit of sea salt over the plain caramels while the chocolate was still wet because I like salted caramels and it did have a nice flavor. For a prettier presentation, I would use flaky sea salt (also on the baking aisle).

*I encourage you to dip at least half the caramels in chocolate. I didn’t think caramel could get any better after I made it from scratch. And then I dipped it. And dipped some more!