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Title: English Toffee -- Part 1
Categories: Candies, Desserts, Nuts, Chocolate
Yield: 1 1/2 lb/700

6 oz (170 g) semi-sweet chocolate
- chips
1 c (200 g) sugar
1/2 c (60 g) chopped almonds
1 ts (5 mL) vanilla extract
1/8 ts Salt
1 c (225 g) unsalted butter

Toffee is a hard candy made mainly with sugar and butter. In
America, the term "English toffee" is generally used for
toffee prepared with a coating of chocolate and almonds.

This recipe is easy to prepare and yields a full flavored,
crunchy toffee that has just a little "stickiness" when
chewed.

To create toffee, we will basically heat sugar and butter
until the sugar reaches the hard crack stage (300ºF/150ºC).

If you don't allow the sugar to reach this temperature
before cooling, the texture will be different. For example,
if heated to the soft crack stage (the temperature range
just below hard crack), the candy would be more like a
butterscotch than a brittle, crunchy toffee. (In some parts
of the world, this is also considered a toffee, but it's not
what comes to mind when I hear the word.) If the sugar is
heated beyond 320ºF/160ºC, then it might not retain its
solid form and turn into liquid caramel over time.

Select a small saucepan. Make sure the saucepan is large
enough to contain about double the volume of the butter and
sugar. As the mixture cooks, it will bubble and increase in
volume - using too small of a pan may result in overflows.

Melt the butter in the saucepan with the sugar and salt plus
a little (about 2 teaspoons, 10 mL) water over gentle heat.
(Low heat is important to prevent separation later. Just be
patient and let it melt together.) The extra water will make
it easier for the sugar to heat evenly and melt together.

Stir the mixture constantly while heating over medium-high
heat. The butter and sugar will bubble and foam as the water
boils off. This can take several minutes because butter
contains a decent amount of water. The volume of the mixture
will increase dramatically at this point. At this point the
temperature should be relatively constant at a few degrees
above the boiling point of water.

Once the water has boiled off, the mixture will collapse and
thicken. The temperature will also start to rise again. The
goal is to remove the pan from the heat once the mixture
passes 300ºF/150ºC and before it reaches 320ºF/160ºC.

Use an instant read thermometer or candy thermometer to keep
track of the temperature as you heat2and stir because the
temperature can change pretty rapidly once the
off.

CONTINUED TO PART TWO

From: http://www.cookingforengineers.com

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