Caramel is a delight for adults and children. Sweet, tasty, on a stick and without, well, how can you be afraid, even despite the harm to the teeth. And the best part is that caramel can easily be made at home from regular sugar.
For cooking, you just need to choose the right dishes, prepare the necessary ingredients and delight everyone with sweetness without artificial additives and dyes.
What is caramel? Composition of the product
This sweet word has been known to many since childhood. Caramel is a burnt sugar, as they say in common people. Yes, this is nothing more than a sweet candy obtained by melting sugar. But there are differences in composition between home and industrial caramel. In the process of preparing the second, artificial dyes, chemical thickeners, and flavorings are added to it.
In the preparation of homemade treats, all of these chemicals are excluded. The main ingredients are sugar, water, citric acid or vinegar. But, in addition to this, you can add:
- nuts
- candied fruits and dried fruits;
- pieces of fruit;
- coconut flakes, etc.
Caramel is not only harmful to the teeth, but also a blow to the waist, if there is an excess of it.
But from one little sweetie there will be no harm, only pleasure. As for the calorie content of caramel, then per 100 grams of this product, there are 362 kcal. Although who will gobble up at a time or per day 100 grams of goodies?
Types of Caramel
Caramel happens:
- dry, in the form of candies;
- soft or semi-solid, which can be used as an additive in other desserts;
- caramel with filling, which is more difficult to prepare, since its outer shell is a candy caramel, and inside there is a liquid filling of any taste.
At home, it’s easier to make a sweet and soft-looking sweetness.
Basic principles of cooking
One of the main principles of making homemade sweets is the rejection of artificial additives.
Caramel is prepared very quickly, so before preparing it, you need to prepare everything in advance, and not be distracted from the process itself, otherwise the sweet will burn.
If in the process of cooking the melted sugar gets on the dishes, it must be soaked immediately, because then it will be more difficult to wash it.
Preparatory Activities
Before you cook caramel yourself, you need to foresee and prepare everything.
- Cane sugar is ideal for caramel, because it was from it that the first sweet was prepared. It is also healthier than beetroot, and finished caramel gives a pleasant speck.
- You need to boil the sugar over low heat so that it does not burn.
- For your own safety, gloves must be worn, as if burnt sugar gets on your skin, it causes burns.
- Suitable dishes - with a thick bottom (cast iron pan or aluminum pan).
Cooking Dry Caramel at Home
This recipe is for beginners, as it is simple. For the manufacture of fragrant candies, you will need the following ingredients:
- 200 grams of sugar;
- 60 ml of water;
- a few drops of vinegar or lemon juice.
From the dishes:
- deep pan or pan;
- deep plate;
- molds for candy, many use teaspoons, spoons must be lubricated with oil in advance.
Culinary process:
- Cool water is poured into a plate.
- 60 ml of water are poured into the pan, put on fire. Fall asleep sugar.
- As soon as the sugar begins to melt, it begins to mix.
- Lemon juice or vinegar is added to the resulting sugar syrup.
- As soon as the sugar becomes liquid, dipped in spoons, oiled, and filled with caramel.
- A filled spoon is quickly immersed in a plate of water for 7-10 seconds, and then transferred to a dry towel.
- In this way, fill all forms until the liquid in the pan runs out.
In the process of melting sugar, you can add herbal extracts, cream or berry juice to it. Thus, the output will be cough drops, milk or fruit sweets. Caramel is also beneficial.
Soft homemade caramel
Soft caramel is tasty both on its own and as an additive to cakes and pastries.
It is prepared from:
- 300 grams of sugar;
- fat cream or sour cream - 335 grams;
- salted butter - 70 grams.
Caramel recipe step by step:
- All 300 grams of sugar must be divided into 6 equal servings, that is, 50 grams.
- A pan with a thick bottom is put on fire. Pour the first portion of sugar into it. Once it melts, add a second portion. Do not mix.
- Thus, all portions of sugar are introduced into the pan. In this case, do not interfere.
- Cream or sour cream are set separately on a fire to heat, but not boil.
- As soon as sugar becomes a pure amber color, it is removed from the stove, oil is added to it and cream is slowly poured. Now you can stir everything until smooth.
- Then the pan with a viscous mass is sent back to the stove and simmer on low heat for another 6 minutes.
- Over time, soft caramel is cleaned in the refrigerator for at least a day.
- Having caramel the next day, it can be eaten with a spoon, added to dessert or cut into cubes and braided in the form of soft toffee.
Lollipops
Who doesn't know caramel on a stick? Not modern "Chupa-Chupsy", namely caramel on a wooden stick, often in the form of cockerels or bunnies. The taste of childhood, not otherwise.
Such a delicacy is easy to prepare at home, especially since complex and hard-to-reach ingredients are not required. And you also need to prepare molds-cockerels (optional) and always wooden sticks, you can toothpicks.
As a natural dye, you can use berry juice, or you can add a special food coloring.
For the preparation of lollipops, you will need the same list of ingredients as for the preparation of “stickless”. The list is in the first recipe.
The preparation is the same, but there are some nuances associated with the insertion of the sticks into the candy.
- As soon as the caramel is cooked on the stove, it is removed from the fire.
- Quickly spread parchment paper on the table, grease it with vegetable oil.
- With a spoon, caramel is poured onto the paper in a fine stream, giving the desired shape. And you can put the finished form on paper (the same cock) and pour caramel into it. On a parchment several candies should lie in a row.
- Allow them to cool for a little, literally a few seconds, and then carefully insert the sticks into them. For the sticks to enter faster, they need to be inserted in rotating movements (as in a spiral).
- In this form, leave the candies until they cool completely.
Honey Caramel Recipe
The sugary-sweet sugar-honey pleasure in one small caramel will cause a real delight. To cook such a treat at home is possible from:
- sugar - 150 grams;
- melted honey - 200 grams.
You will need another silicone mat.
Stages of preparation:
- The listed ingredients are poured into a small saucepan with a thick bottom.
- Cook them on high heat until the sugar is completely dissolved. In this case, stir the mixture with a wooden spoon.
- After melting the sugar, the fire is removed to moderate and the syrup is boiled to 160 ° C, that is, until the mixture boils and becomes liquid.
- Hot caramel mixture is poured onto the silicone mat. Give her a little cool and thicken.
- Using the same rug, a lump is rolled from it.
- As soon as the caramel cools down to the possibility of picking it up, you need to roll a thick tourniquet out of it. If in the process of formation she nevertheless burns her hands, it is worth putting on thick rubber gloves.
- If there is a desire to obtain pearl-colored caramels, the tourniquet is stretched several times and folded in half. If this is not done, the color of the candies will be transparent.
- The tourniquet is cut into small portions with a knife.
Conclusion
Caramel is a great way to pamper your loved ones, especially children. It is prepared simply, the ingredients require the simplest, but it turns out attractively tasty. Various additives in the form of nuts or fruit juices will make caramel even tastier.
If you want sweets, but there is nothing at home, then in a few minutes, cook sugar candies that will quench your thirst for sweets. But remember, caramel is also harmful to the teeth, in excess, of course.