Since discovering an English Toffee recipe on the TV talk show "People are Talking", I've been making this toffee for family and friends. How long? Well, let's just say long enough that I've had to buy a new candy thermometer - not because I wore it out, but because I needed one with bigger numbers - oh, the better to read it, my dear.
Nowadays, they would say it's Crack-Toffee..and actually that's not far off because you have to cook it until it reaches 300 degree crack temperature - but I digress.
The tradition...I make toffee and my boys (that includes my hubby) eat as much as they can before I put it in a Christmas-tree-Santa-sleigh-or-any-other-holiday-du-jour-container to give away to friends and co-workers. It's a great tradition - and I've learned to adjust my ingredients list at the grocery store to include the invasion so I'm able to give away some of it!
As the butter melts, the sugar is added and melted into submission it becomes bubbling gold - or bubbling flesh, as my nephew, Jason used to call it - but that was when he was 9 and it was really cool to try to gross out your aunt. The house fills with melted butter aromas - now I know what Julia Child's kitchen smelled like (I loved that movie!) and there's a hint of sweetness with all that added sugar...and then comes the melted chocolate that gets smoothed around like frosting...love it!
bubbling up ~
sprinkled with almonds~Making this toffee is also therapeutic ~ it makes you slow down because you have to pay attention to the temperatures and the timing - it has to reach 300 degrees at it's own time, not yours. It bubbles up with such fury after adding the baking soda and you know you have seconds to pour it onto the cookie sheet - but then you have to wait for it to harden before you can top it with the chocolate. Once I get started, I can't be interrupted - it helps me to focus focus focus.
I love traditions - and this one especially - because it brings such smiles to the faces of my family and such wonderful aromas to our home. It feels like I accomplished something really cool. Or maybe it's the Greek in me - for some reason, I grew up with the notion that Greeks are candy makers - maybe because we had relatives and friends that owned the best candy stores in San Francisco - and I got to go behind the scenes and pick out my favorite creams - orange, raspberry or those light green ones we never knew what flavor they were - all layed out on those long marble slabs...loved that!
Blessed Solstice, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year ~
I wish you Peace within your hearts and Sweetness in your Life every day~
