Kitchen Stuff - The Sugar Thermometer

Another of those posts about things in my Kitchen... I've been making fudge tonight which I was going to post about in detail but the recipe says I need to leave it overnight to cool and as it's both the oddest fudge recipe I've tried to make and one that I think I might have made a bit of a mess of (I certainly made a mess with it) I guess it would be better to wait for it to be ready and try it before saying much about it. I don't think it's going to beat this fudge recipe from Hope and Greenwoods 'Life Is Sweet' which is so far the best I've found and the bench mark against which all other fudge has been measured for the last 3 years (the salt in that recipe was my own addition and totally unnecessary).

The thing is that without a sugar thermometer I wouldn't be making fudge at all. My sister and I had a go at it many years ago, we wasted a lot of ingredients trying to make 2 batches and totally messing it up. What the recipe failed to adequately explain was just how bloody long it takes, all it said was bring to a rolling boil after the sugar has melted and that it was done when it made a soft ball in cold water. You can get what looked for all the world to us like a soft ball long before we were really at the soft ball stage (somewhere about 112 degrees C) and it's not like you can stick a finger in to see how you're getting on. It was a bit vague on the stirring bit as well - Miss Hope makes it clear that a good ten minutes with an electric beater is called for, a couple of minutes with a wooden spoon (which is as long as any reasonable person is likely to want to beat something with a spoon for) just won't do the job. 

My sugar thermometer is a fairly unsophisticated model (it came with a warning not to expose it to extreme temperatures which was a little bit worrying), I have occasionally hankered after a swish probe sort of a thing which would give exact readings on some sort of easy to see display panel (no more squinting through clouds of steam nose a mere inch or two from a volatile pan of boiling sugar and fat) but I wouldn't swap this one for two reasons. It was a present from my dad who had heard me mention that it's something I wanted so went to the trouble of finding one and posting it down from Shetland as a surprise. It's not the first time he's done something like that but it's enough of a novelty to invest the thermometer with a certain sentimental attachment (I'm also sentimentally attached to a small adjustable spanner, thanks dad!). I also prefer things that aren't battery operated because I can guarantee that the batteries will fail at the most inopportune moment possible. 

It's amazing the difference the right gadget makes. It's not impossible to make jam without a sugar thermometer, all it takes is a cold plate to check for setting points, but it's so much better when you can take the guess work out of it. Watching the thermometer creep towards the magic temperature has given me a far better idea of how long it takes and helped me notice how the textures change (it hasn't stopped me letting things boil over because I turned my back for a moment at a critical stage or was overly optimistic about how much would go in the pan). Fudge, as I've said, is beyond me without one. Post thermometer fudge has become a Christmas staple (everyone gets a bag of it, like it or not), and there's a whole world of other sweets it opens up (for better or worse I swear this will be the year I make Turkish Delight).     

Miss Hope’s Chocolate Box

I’ve been flirting with the idea of making my own chocolates since 2003 when Chantal Coady’s ‘Real Chocolate’ came out. I didn’t buy it, and didn’t start making my own but I browsed enough to realise that you need quite a lot of kit (marble slab, dipping forks, chocolate scrappers, moulds, a thermometer...) and most likely a steady hand and lots of patience. I did buy ‘Chocolate – The Definitive Guide’ by Sarah Jayne-Stanes (published by Grub Street which was inducement enough) it has excellent truffle recipes and more instructions regarding kit, I made the truffles but dipping them is tricky without the little fork things, and messy, so we ended up eating lots of truffle insides. The procrastination continued but now Hope and Greenwood have released ‘Miss Hope’s Chocolate Box’ and I’m determined that this will be the year I do it.

I really liked ‘Life is Sweet’ and have very high hopes for this sequel. There are a couple of disclaimers - I  sometimes find the jolly hockey sticks with extra camp approach a little distracting (although more often than not it makes me laugh and heaven knows there are more than enough cook books out there that take themselves far to seriously), and as already indicated there are a lot of things you need for some of these chocolates with couverture (for making nice shiny chocolate shells) which seems to be indispensable for the more advanced recipes - it's also expensive and not the sort of thing you can buy just anywhere. A degree of preparation is needed and  in the last two weeks I have managed to spend quite a lot of time online looking at moulds and wondering if an ordinary thermometer is very different in its range from a chocolate one, washed and scrubbed the dust off the marble slab that came from somewhere or other that I forget and has sat in the kitchen for the last six and a half years doing nothing, got a bit carried away by the idea of edible floral transfers; and bought precisely nothing, although I’m very close to some sea shell moulds, I really am. I think I might need some latex gloves too. Hobbies are expensive.

Despite the threat of financial outlay including the very real likelihood that making chocolates will be considerably more expensive than buying even the very best handmade designer labelled offerings this is still something I really want to have a crack at. If I had the patience and time the pear and chestnut truffles would be one of the first things on the list. There are lots of fudges that I will make, and an earl grey mousse that’s a definite as well. Fig and Cassis truffles look very do-able and are probably a Christmas present just waiting to happen, the praline is another present begging to happen, but the one I really, really, want to make? Salted caramel sea shells. They sound amazing and if I can pull it off look amazing. I would feel so clever, I would look so clever, people would be impressed, and I would probably eat too many of them and feel a bit sick. So you see I have to do it, possibly just as soon as I get paid.

The list of stockists at the back is excellent and altogether this is a nice, useful, and above all inspiring book. I know from ‘Life is Sweet’ that the instructions are reliable and the results good so anyone with a birthday coming up can hope for the best.      

Sunday

Sunday the 5th December and have I been writing Christmas cards? Have I finished my Christmas shopping? Have I had a good and thorough tidy round my flat? Caught up on book reviews and read any of the pile of books clamouring for attention? Finished the Christmas rota for work? Of course not to any of the above, instead I’ve made biscuits, mince pies, and fudge – all very nice and I’m telling myself useful preparation for the next few weeks. I feel very festive (as well as slightly sick after over sampling the fudge) up to and including the seasonal sense of panic that comes from not having started Christmas cards, not knowing where many of my friends live (because now I’ve left it quite late to find out), not remembering the names of most their spouses (far, far, too late to ask), and knowing I’ll be in exactly the same position in a week’s time...

Thanks to a day spent in the kitchen I have a stack of recipes I want to share, and a similar stack of cookbooks I want to rave about – it’s all terribly exciting (for me), indeed I’m so excited I hardly know where to start. Perhaps with an apology to the lovely delivery man from DHL. Gary (that’s his name) got back to me this afternoon after the dozens of dropped calls I left on his mobile to say he was outside my door. I was a good quarter of an hour away but the dear man promised to wait if he couldn’t get someone to take charge of my parcel. He even phoned me back to give me a progress report, so I take back everything I said. Someone who’s prepared to come out on a cold icy Sunday making sure I (and others) don’t have to go to Loughborough is someone who deserves the highest praise.

And now back to the kitchen – I’m quite proud of having made a successful batch of fudge today. I’ve tried before and ended up with a gritty, sticky, sugary mess. Not very nice. This fudge however is really pretty good, in the manner of an obsessive fudge maniac I’ve been comparing the recipe I used before (Nigella) and the one I used today (Hope and Greenwood). Today has much more in the way of detail and that’s clearly the way forward for a recipe pedant like me. The fudge is smooth, creamy, and sweetly delicious with just a hint of saltiness at the finish (I don’t even like fudge very much, more than a very small piece gives me a horrible headache, but none of that’s stopping me feeling ridiculously pleased with this stuff).

The Hope and Greenwood book ‘Life is Sweet’ is one I got last year, was hugely enthusiastic about at the time and then totally failed to use, I plan to spend serious time with it in the new year. I also used my sugar thermometer (a present from my dear dad last year) for the first time – turns out it makes all the difference.

Salted Vanilla Fudge

8 inch shallowish baking tin lined with baking parchment

700g granulated sugar

75g unsalted butter

200ml evaporated milk

200ml double cream

Seeds scraped from a vanilla pod

Maldon Sea Salt (or similar)

Place the sugar, butter, evaporated milk and cream in a heavy bottomed pan (one with good deep sides) and gently heat until the sugar has dissolved stirring all the while with a wooden spoon.

Introduce the sugar thermometer to the pan and turn up the heat to medium, bring the mix to boiling point, stirring regularly to make sure it doesn’t stick on the bottom. After 15 minutes it should have reached 100°c (212°f) at which point lower the heat as this is the danger point for burning.

Keep heating until it reaches 115°c (240°f) (soft ball...) this took far longer than I would have believed possible. When temperature is reached take off the heat and start to beat with an electric whisk – carry on for about 7 minutes and then add the vanilla seeds, carry on beating for another 5 to 7 minutes or until the fudge loses its glossy look and gets grainy round the edges. Just at the last minute add a good pinch or two of salt and whisk that in to.

Dollop into the prepared tin, smooth down and leave to cool. After about an hour score into squares and when it’s finally set (another couple of hours at least) snap into bits ready to share round else you go into some sort of sugar induced coma.