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I love caramel candies. I always had them as a kid and I loved how sticky they were, even though they were probably super bad for my teeth. I would always find it a fun game to see how fast I could unstick it from the roof of my mouth or my back molars. I’m sure you’re thinking, “wow Julie was a weird kid.” Haha, but I really liked the Werther’s soft caramel that they came out with several years ago. I think that’s my favorite caramel candy, until, of course, I made my own!
I made these apple cider caramels because it was one of my bucket list items to conquer in the kitchen. I really wanted to learn how to make some sort of candy in the kitchen and I knew caramels were a pretty easy way to start but something about boiling sugar just freaked me out and I refused to do it. I just always got this vision in my head that it’d splatter all over my arm and I’d get horrendous burns. Dramatic, much?
I finally decided to conquer that sugar fear and just do it! Turns out, there’s nothing really scary about it and it’s actually super easy and low maintenance. Although, I will say, that if you ever want a really good arm workout, cut some caramels. That was the hardest part of all this. Cutting this the next morning. I Google’d it and a lot of tips came up with guitar string. I don’t have guitar strings just lying around the house so I just decided to use the sharp warm knife approach. It worked well but man, after cutting about 64 caramels, my arm and hands were sore!
Apple cider caramels literally just scream Fall. I mean, I just picture orange and red leaves, a large apple orchard, and crisp, beautiful weather! They’re so soft and chewy too that you can’t have just one :)
**Note that the boiled cider and apple pie spice that appeared on the blog earlier this week are both used in this recipe!
Apple Cider Caramels
Equipment
Ingredients
- 2 cups (473 ml) heavy cream
- 1 cup (341 g) light corn syrup
- 2 cups (400 g) sugar
- 6 tablespoon (84 g) unsalted butter
- ½ cup (118 ml) boiled cider
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon apple pie spice
Instructions
- Lightly grease an 8×8″ baking pan and line with parchment paper with overhangs on opposite sides. Set aside.
- In a large, nonstick pot, combine cream, corn syrup, sugar, butter, and boiled cider. Bring the mixture to a boil over high heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Reduce to medium-high heat and cook without stirring until the candy thermometer reaches 248 °F (120 °C). It will take about 20-30 minutes depending on your stove and pot.
- Remove the pot from the heat and stir in the salt and apple pie spice.
- Carefully pour the mixture into the prepared pan and let it stand for 12-18 hours at room temperature before cutting into 1″ squares.
- When cutting the caramels, run a very sharp knife under hot water until it’s warm to the touch then spray both sides with cooking spray and cut caramels in a sawing motion.
- Wrap caramels in wax paper.
Notes
Nutrition
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Question for you. I made these last night and my candy thermometer was only going up to about 230 after 45 mins so I used my instant read and it was at almost 300 so I took it off and the caramels are very hard. I’m not sure if there is a difference between the candy one and the instant read. If you have any insight that would be helpful. I’d like to try and make another batch but don’t want to ruin them.
So I don’t dabble much in candy but I did a quick google search and it says there is a difference between candy thermometers and instant reads. If your candy thermometer read 248, that is usually the temperature for soft ball candy. I’m not sure why it turned out so hard. Perhaps you could maybe try for 220? I’m reading my candy thermometer and it says 220 is almost getting to a soft ball consistency. I’m also wondering where your thermometer is clipped onto your pot?
Thanks for responding. It was clipped to the back part of the pot but I did move it to different spots and it was the same. I’m going to try again and cook to only 220 and maybe add a little more cream. I read that if you add another 1/4 to 1/2 cup that they tend to be softer but not to add too much because then you’ll end up with a caramel sauce. This is my first time making caramel candies but I’ve been making caramel sauce for years. Even though they came out pretty hard once you put them in your mouth and they have time to warm up they soften up and are totally amazing.