Oh, the dangers of being a good cook! Seriously, pretty much anything you might want to eat is within your grasp, including the best caramel corn.

Ed was out of town on business last week. I think of these times as a week-long slumber party with myself. I’ll stay up till all hours, watching TV or reading, sleep in, forget about sticking to a proper meal schedule. I just generally indulge myself.

It was on one of those late evenings that I began to crave a snack – sweet, salty, crunchy, any of the three would do, but all in one sounded even better. I’ve always been a fan of Fiddle Faddle, a caramel popcorn that tastes like buttery toffee. They cram a lot of things into the little Polish convenience store in our apartment complex, but sadly, Fiddle Faddle is not one of them.

I’ve come to realize that there’s a recipe out there on the Internet for anything you might want to make. In this case, Top Secret Recipes to the rescue. It involved much more time than I’d planned watching the thermometer in a bubbling pot, but I had a nibble of Fiddle Faddle to finish off the night.

I’m calling it a new international favorite.

Smacznego!

Lois

World’s Best Caramel Corn

Description

Sweet, salty, crunchy, delicious!

Scale

Ingredients

10 cups popped popcorn (a Dutch oven full), lightly salted
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup corn syrup
1/2 cup water
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup sliced almonds

Instructions

Spread the popcorn out in a parchment lined sheet pan, place in a warm oven
Combine the sugars, butter, corn syrup, water, and salt in a pan and bring to a boil
Reduce heat to medium and cook until the temperature reaches 270 F or the hard ball stage
Remove from heat and add vanilla
Sprinkle the almonds over the popcorn and carefully, but quickly pour the hot caramel over the popcorn and nuts in a small, moving, stream covering as much of the popcorn as possible
Toss the popcorn with wooden spoons (the syrup is still hot) to cover all of the corn
Cool and break into pieces