I love Christmas time! From all the holiday decor to the food, but one things for sure at Christmas I feel like I always eat way to much junk! So this year I wanted to make my own candy and lighten it up, but the base of candy is of course sugar, so I thought to myself how do I lighten up sugar? So I thought why not take the water with Clear American water to give it all the flavor it needed. So I packed up my kids, and headed to Walmart to pick up the items I needed.
Once I got home I started right away on my hard candy I knew that I wanted to make two different types of hard candy one with Clear American Strawberry, and one with Clear American Mandarin Orange. Hard candy is not hard to make, but takes time to because you have to get it to the right temp. if you do not, you might as well just pour down the candy syrup and try again. In college I used to make candy in 10 to 15 lbs batches. It was a chores to sit and watch the sugar boil, trust me there is nothing worst then sugar that boils over it will smell up your whole house!
Strawberry Clear American Water Hard Candy Recipe
Ingredients
4 cups white sugar
1 cups light corn syrup
1 cup Clear American Strawberry Water
1/2 teaspoon food coloring (optional)
1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar for dusting
Directions
In a medium saucepan, stir together the white sugar, corn syrup, and water. Cook, stirring, over medium heat until sugar dissolves, then bring to a boil. Without stirring, heat to 300 to 310 degrees F (149 to 154 degrees C), or until a small amount of syrup dropped into cold water forms hard, brittle threads.
Remove from heat and stir in food coloring, if desired. Pour onto a greased cookie sheet, and dust the top with confectioners’ sugar. Let cool, and break into pieces. Store in an airtight container.
A couple hint with this, make sure you stir the mixture until the sugar is dissolve it will boil faster, also I let it get to 312 to 315 before I pull it off the heat I found that the candy worked better.
Now I am going to show you step by step pictures on how to make it. Cause if you are anything like me you need pictures. :)
Step one pure 4 cups of sugar into your sauce pan
Step two pure 1 cup of light corn syrup into your sauce pan.
Step three Pure 1 cup of Clear American Strawberry water into the pan
Step four Cook the mixture over mid-high heat until it reaches 310 degrees makes sure you stir the mixture until all the sugar is dissolved.
Now I went ahead and added my red food color as I wanted it to cook into the sugar.
Step five lightly grease a cookie sheet with a lip and add a layer of powder sugar to it, pour the hot sugar liquid it to, let cool. Once it is cool add a layer of powder sugar and break into pieces. I used a wooded spoon to break mine into pieces.
This hard candy did not need any flavoring at all, it tasted just like strawberry! I did the same thing with the Mandarin Orange water, because my son loves this water it is a treat for him. The only difference I did was color the water green because green is his Favorite color.
Now one recipe I have been wanting to make all Christmas has been divinity. Now I know what you are thinking really divinity with Clear American water, but I am here to tell you if you have a lot of patience it can happened! It did take me FOUR yes I will say it again FOUR try’s to get it right, but once I did it was the softest but pillow filled yummiest divinity I have ever had. My husband who hates divinity loved it! Here is my recipe as I had to make it up on my own EKK I know! Now please do not let this scare you from making this, one thing divinity can be hard because I live in a heavy humid place, also it was to rain that day which could also play a part. Just know that it was worth it!
Ingredients
2 cups sugar
1 cup white corn syrup
1 cup clear american water
3 egg whites
Directions
In a heavy saucepan over medium heat, stir together the sugar, corn syrup, and clear american water. Stir only until sugar has dissolved. Do not stir after this point. Cook syrup mixture until it reaches 250 degrees F on a candy thermometer, bringing it to a hard ball stage.
While the syrup is cooking, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Once the sugar mixture reaches 250 degrees F, carefully pour a slow steady stream of syrup into the stiffly beaten egg whites, beating constantly at high speed. continue to beat until mixture holds its shape, approximately 35 mins. NO JOKE! it took me 35 mins of beating good thing for the kitchen aid!
Using 2 spoons, drop the divinity onto waxed paper, using 1 spoon to push the candy off the other. If the candy becomes too stiff, add a few drops of hot water. You will need to work fast when making this type of candy. After you spoon the cooked sugar onto the waxed paper, you’re done. Cool the candies on racks completely.
Step one In a heavy saucepan over medium heat, stir together the sugar, corn syrup, and clear american water.
Step two Cook syrup mixture until it reaches 250 degrees F on a candy thermometer, bringing it to a hard ball stage.
Step three While the syrup is cooking, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.
Step four Once the sugar mixture reaches 250 degrees F, carefully pour a slow steady stream of syrup into the stiffly beaten egg whites, beating constantly at high speed.
Step five Using 2 spoons, drop the divinity onto waxed paper, using 1 spoon to push the candy off the other. If the candy becomes too stiff, add a few drops of hot water. You will need to work fast when making this type of candy. After you spoon the cooked sugar onto the waxed paper, you’re done. Cool the candies on racks completely.
As you can see Candy making can be fun and simple, but when you add Clear American water to your candy it takes your candy to a whole new flavor level. I knwo that for now on I will be make my candy with Clear American water. So what are you waiting for get into the kitchen today and make some candy with Clear American Water. Don’t forget you can follow Clear American on twitter and fan them on facebook as well.
This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias. #CBias All thoughts are my own.
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