sweets
lollipops, candy canes & hard candy filling. Though these candies take serious skill to make at home, the rewards also make highly personalized holiday presents or hostess gifts. “When you’re thinking about holiday gifts, hard candy is something that’s personal and takes time to make,” Shiller says. “It takes skill, and you can ‘wow’ and amaze your friends with it. You can also really control the process: We’re not using high-fructose corn syrup. You have the ability to do it the way you envisioned.” After you master the art and science of basic hard-candy making, delve into some personalization: Try out different candy molds, food coloring or techniques such as bending to create candy in fun shapes and shades. For a more elegant gift, try adding dried fruit or nuts to plain, round molds before pouring sugar on top. You can get just as creative with packaging and presentation: Clear plastic or white waxy wrappers are available from candy suppliers, and you’ll want to wrap your candies in either one of those first to keep the candy as dry as possible. But the sky’s the limit on the second wrapper: Drop into local craft stores to peruse selections of stickers, papers, ribbon, stamps and scissors with shaped or textured blades to cut festive wrapper edges.
Poured Sugar Candies A copper pot with a small pouring spout on the side is a candy maker’s best friend. Invest in one to make hard candy consistently and correctly every time. For this recipe, look for alcohol-based food coloring, which will work best. Yield | 12 | 12 7 17½ 7 10 10
lollipop sticks (optional) vegetable oil oz cold water oz pure granulated cane sugar oz light corn syrup drops food coloring drops oil-based candy flavoring
| Preparation | If making lollipops, place lollipop sticks into desired silicone, tempered-plastic or metal candy molds designed for hard candies. If using plastic or metal molds, very lightly rub molds with vegetable oil prior to casting. Pour cold water into a copper pot. Add cane sugar and mix gently. Using a pastry brush dipped in water, wash down the sides of the pot, ensuring no sugar crystals remain on sides. Bring to a boil on medium heat. Once boiling, add corn syrup. Continue to occasionally wash down sides of pot with pastry brush dipped in water during cooking, until mixture reaches 260ºF on a digital probe or candy thermometer. Boil on high heat until sugar registers 299ºF. Add coloring and flavoring and swirl pot to incorporate fully. Let pot sit over heat until all bubbles dissipate. Carefully fill molds by pouring in a small stream of hot sugar. Do not use a spoon and do not scrape sugar from sides of pan into molds. Let molds rest until sugar hardens, about 20 minutes. Gently unmold lollipops, wiping excess oil from surface of candy
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if necessary. Using a cooking or kitchen torch, pass a flame over the surface of the hardened lollipop to create a crystal-clear appearance. Allow to cool before packaging or serving.
Pulled Sugar Candies You will need a pair of cotton butler’s gloves with a pair of powder-free latex gloves on top to avoid burning yourself or crystallizing the sugar while pulling it. Shiller recommends placing a Silpat on an electric griddle set to the lowest setting to create the ideal resting place for hardened sugar to become pliable again. Yield | 12 | TarTaric acid SoluTion
1 1
oz water oz tartaric acid
candiES
7 17½ 6 7 10 10 12
oz cold water oz pure granulated cane sugar oz light corn syrup drops tartaric acid solution (recipe below) drops oil-based candy flavoring drops food coloring lollipop sticks
| Preparation – Tartaric Acid Solution | Bring water to a boil. Stir in tartaric acid until fully dissolved. Allow to cool and set aside. | Preparation – Candies | Pour cold water into a copper pot. Add cane sugar, mixing gently. Using a pastry brush dipped in water, wash down the sides of the pot, ensuring no sugar crystals remain on sides. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Once boiling, add corn syrup. Continue to occasionally wash down sides of pot with pastry brush dipped in water while cooking, until mixture reaches 260ºF on a candy or digital probe thermometer. Boil on high heat until sugar registers 285ºF. Using an eyedropper, add tartaric acid solution. Continue cooking on high heat until sugar registers 320ºF. Add flavoring and swirl pot to incorporate fully (do not use a spoon or stir). Pour 2/3 of the mixture onto a Silpat non-stick silicone baking mat. Color the remaining liquefied sugar as desired and pour onto another Silpat. As the clear syrup cools around the edges, use gloved fingertips to push and fold the outside edges toward the center of the pool. Repeat this process with colored sugar. Continue
to push and fold the edges of the warm sugar toward the center until the sugar forms a pliable mass that can be kneaded. Knead clear sugar, continuously folding it in half and pulling it until it is opaque, white and shiny. Repeat this process with colored sugar. Roll white sugar into a long cylindrical tube. Pull colored sugar into long narrow ribbons and wrap the tube with colored strips. While sugar is still pliable, gently pull the cylinder, creating a narrower cylinder as you pull. Wrap the narrow cylinder of sugar around a lollipop stick, twisting to create your desired color and lollipop pattern. Allow to cool before packaging or serving.