The Sugar Incident

This weekend I went to Chicago to celebrate both my Dad and Grandmother's birthdays, so naturally I thought I would bring along some baked goods! I feel like I have a pretty good skill set for working with doughs, but I haven't ventured too much into sugar. I've made caramels, but thats about the extent of it. I think this project may have been a bit ambitious! I started out with coconut marshmellows, inspired by Little Flower Candy CO. in Pasadena. Sounded simple enough, turns out not so much...Working with the sugar temperature proved quite difficult. I needed it to reach 245 degrees, after it steadily climbed for 5 minutes it stopped at 220 degrees, and then wouldn't move...I stepped away for a minute, and of course it had jumped to about 250, I immediately pulled it hoping the 5 degrees didn't completely alter the result.

Pouring the sugar mixture! It looked really dark, and I wasn't sure if the temperature had dropped too much, at this point I was just hopping it would taste alright, even if it didn't look quite right.



Starting to look like marshmellow (to my great relief!). This is about 15 minutes into mixing, really wishing I had a stand mixer at this point!



The final product! Rolled in a powdered sugar mixture. And best of all-tasted like marshmellow! It didn't look perfect, but tasted great! I'd like to give these another go to see if I can improve the texture/appearance.



Finished lemon bars-the only simple part of this cooking venture! The filling is really simple, I think the homemade crust is what sets it apart. I loved these, and so did the intended recipient with discerning lemon bar taste (glad you liked them Mom!)




Then there was the nougat...The recipe indicated that it was difficult, but of course I thought, maybe difficult for your average home baker, but I can handle this! I was partially right, I could handle it. But it was far more difficult than I thought it would be! Aside from lengthy prep work (see below) I had to work with two sugar mixtures, adding sugar, butter and cornstarch in two different ratios. Both are put on high and when the first one reaches about 230 degrees it is transferred to a bowl containing the wet ingredients (mixing with an electric mixer the whole time). Once the second reaches 273 it is also added. This was mainly so hard because I don't have a stand mixer, so trying to hold the mixer and tend to two boiling pots of sugar proved difficult!



Blanching almonds (aka boiling and peeling)-took much longer than I had anticipated...Along with shelling a cup and a half of pistachios!



Finished Nougat with almonds, pistachios and dried cherries! Although it was difficult, it ended up tasting great, and felt like an accomplishment for it to even turn out!