mix, mix…stir, stir

An easy bar cookie fancied up with a coat of chocolate and toffee bits is hard to resist. This week the Tuesday with Dorie bakers made Caramel Crunch Bars from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking: From My Home to Yours, and they were a hit with David and me.

Dorie maximizes the indulgence by making ice cream sandwiches with them, but I stopped short of that and directed my indulgence at the toffee topping. Rather than sprinkling the bars with toffee bits, I decided to make toffee tiles and not just any toffee; mine was spiked with cinnamon and cayenne pepper! The cayenne was just enough for a subtle bite of heat to rise up after each bite, almost unnoticeable, but I found it balanced the very sweet cookie nicely. A light dusting of Dutched cocoa powder also tempered the sweetness of the brown sugar short bread cookie and added a pretty mottled look to the toffee.

The cookie base is a brown sugar short bread studded with chocolate bits and in my case seasoned with a teaspoon of cinnamon rather than the espresso powder Dorie uses. My cookie base was a little greasy, and I believe it’s because I let the butter warm up beyond room temperature. I generally work with butter that is about 65-66 degrees F, but it was a bit softer this time. Thanks to Whitney of What’s Left on the Table, for selecting this week’s recipe. She has posted the recipe for Caramel Crunch Bars on her blog.

I have been playing around with different toffee recipes for months. Most posts I have read declar toffee to be so easy to make, but never address the issue of the sugar and butter separating into a useless mess. This has happened to me a number of times and I have concluded that the length of time it cooks and stirring technique can be culprits. The other issue I have with most toffee is the inability to get a dark caramel flavor by melting all the ingredients together from the start. I have come up with a technique that develops a dark caramel flavor and seems to remain cohesive. It’s a little more effort, but the rich caramel flavor of the toffee is worth having to cook the sugar in two pots simultaneously. I still have some butter separate out as it is cooling, but never to the point of ruining the toffee. For the tiles on the Caramel Crunch Bars, I poured the toffee out onto a silpat to cover an 11×17 sheet pan so it is very thin and easy to bite through. If I am planning to dip the candy in chocolate, I leave it a little thicker.

Dark Caramel Toffee

1 cup granulated sugar, divided
1 ½ tablespoons corn syrup, divided
¾ cup unsalted butter (6 oz.)
2 tablespoons water
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon sea salt

Measure the spices and salt into a small dish and set aside. Line an 11×17 inch rimmed pan with a silicone mat or parchment paper and grease the side walls of the pan, set aside.

In a medium sized heavy-bottomed pan melt the butter, ½ cup of sugar and ½ tablespoon of corn syrup over low heat, stirring occasionally. Let this simmer while getting the second pan going.

 In a small sized heavy-bottomed pan combine ½ cup sugar, 1 tablespoon corn syrup, and 2 tablespoons water. Stir until dissolved over medium-low heat. Once the sugar dissolves, stop stirring, increase the heat to medium, and wash down the sides of the pan with a wet pastry brush to rinse away any sugar crystals. Let the sugar cook without stirring until it is a deep caramel color.

While the sugar is cooking, monitor the butter-sugar mixture, stirring occasionally and keeping it at gentle simmer. Wash the sides of this pan down with the wet pastry brush as well. When the caramelizing sugar is beginning to take on a nice dark color, increase the heat of the butter-sugar mixture to bring it to a boil. As soon as the caramelizing sugar reaches the desired level of darkness, pour it into the butter-sugar mixture, and using a clean wooden or silicone spoon (no sugar crystals) stir slowly and steadily to incorporate (Don’t scrape the caramelized sugar from the pan, just use what will pour freely). Cook this mixture at a full boil until it reaches 300 degrees F, occasionally stirring gently. Once it hits 300 degrees F, mix in the spices and stir gently to incorporate, maintaining the boil. With the toffee at a full boil, pour it onto the lined sheet pan and gently spread it to the edges of the pan.

If butter begins to separate out around the edges or pools on top, carefully absorb it with a paper towel. Let the toffee cool about 1 minute and then begin pressing in score lines with a chef’s knife. Work in one direction pressing lines into the toffee about every 1 – 1 ½ inches. The lines might melt away initially, but just keep going over them and once the toffee is cool enough they will set. As soon as the score marks are starting to hold in one direction, begin making score lines the other direction. It is not necessary to cut all the way through the toffee, just create a line for the toffee to break along. Once the toffee is set, let it cool completely then snap the pieces apart.