Guest Post: Neighbor Nancy!

December 13, 2010

Hello Everyone,

I’ve got the best post to share with you this morning. Remember when I did my little stand out in the front garden, and I said my inspiration was my neighbor, Nancy, who had a stand where she sold fresh flower arrangements all summer? Well, Nancy was kind enough to agree to do a guest post on my blog today!

Nancy is such a talented crafter, baker, decorator, gardener, and the list goes on. Every summer, we ogle her luscious flower garden (with lots of vegetables hidden in between), and every winter for as long as I can remember, she’s dropped in handmade Christmas ornaments for our tree.

But what I always look forward to at Christmas is the treat she explains below. So yum.

***

My name is Nancy and I am lucky enough to live around the corner from Emily’s family in that special place called China Village.

I first met Emily when she was a beautiful 18-month-old with curly brown hair and a permanent smile on her face. I became her babysitter and am the mother of her first best playmate—my son Andrew.

Before I start to tell you about making buttercrunch, I just want to reveal something about Emily you might not all know. She was the world’s best napper. She went to bed happy, woke up happy, and slept for a very long time. I have never seen another napper who could touch Emily’s excellence in that department.

Now down to business. Every year between Thanksgiving and Christmas, I make many batches of a delicious candy called buttercrunch. It is not hard to make and is a great gift. I am on the lookout all year for jars and containers that would be good for holding buttercrunch at holiday gift-giving time.

In my recipe box this is the only recipe I have that has a date on it. I copied it from my mother on Nov. 25, 1977. I was surprised to discover that I have been making it for 33 years!

These are the simple ingredients that you will need to make this delicious candy:

2 cups sugar
½ cup water
½ cup light Karo corn syrup (Emily edit: Golden syrup should work too)
1 cup butter
12 ounce bag of chocolate bits (Emily edit: I think you could use any chunked up chocolate bars)
Finely chopped walnuts (I imagine any nut would be tasty)

The only tricks to making this successfully are patience and a good candy thermometer. (I have an old one that clips to the side of my deep saucepan)

Cook the first four ingredients over medium heat until the candy thermometer reaches 285 degrees F. This could take 30-45 minutes and is a good project to do while you are in the kitchen doing other things. Don’t forget to give the ingredients a stir quite frequently. The mixture will become thick and amber-colored. The second the thermometer reaches 285 degrees, I pour the very hot mixture into two buttered, slightly flexible metal jelly roll pans.

Rather quickly I spread the mixture out as much as I can with a metal spatula. As soon as you have finished spreading out the hot toffee, sprinkle the chocolate chips evenly over the two pans. In a couple of minutes the chocolate will soften and you can spread it out over the toffee. Then sprinkle finely chopped nuts over the chocolate. Sometimes I like to add chopped up holiday M&Ms; to the nuts for some extra color.

Let the pans cool overnight before trying to break the buttercrunch into pieces. This is the fun part. Flip the big piece of buttercrunch over so the nuts are face down in the pan. My cracker of choice is an old wooden pestle. I whack away at it until the pieces are a good size to fit into your mouth. I fill the jars and put them in a cool room, waiting a few days before giving them away. The candy seems to become kinder to your teeth if you wait this much time —or more.