You’re damn right that the picture right there isn’t the result of my hard work. That’s what the recipe I used was supposed to look like. The thing of it is, candy making is awful! It’s truly more science than cooking. No, I mean it’s way more science than cooking! You could grill up the most amazing steak, slow cook an award-winning lobster bisque, or fry up a bucket of chicken that makes Harland Sanders himself rise up and declare, “Oh my lawd! What the heck did you just do there, son?” and in all of it, you will still never encounter directions that tell you to “cook till it reaches 236 degrees.”
Fudge, peanut brittle, rock candy, they all will buck back if you don’t do it just right! Not only that, and you won’t find this printed in any of the recipes, but you also better pay attention to the barometric pressure. Living in Florida, I can tell you, for sure, that there is simply no making candy during certain parts of the year, no matter what your thermostat is set for, and one of those times of year is July.
Of course, in Florida November can be one of those months too. My wife makes peanut brittle every year for Christmas gifts, and every three years people actually receive peanut brittle from my wife for Christmas. Ok, so the stuff didn’t turn out fudge-like. I can at least testify what penuche tastes like and that it’s delicious. I did, after all, get the ingredients right. Mine just didn’t bite quite right.
Of course, as baking keeps coming up on The List, I’m starting to understand that puddings, fudges, and cookies are all pretty much just sugar and butter combined into differnt textures. As I’m not the hugest fan of fudges anyway, so it was pretty ok that today’s candy didn’t do what it was supposed to do. I had some extra nibblies left over from National Sugar Cookie day, and this penuche dip turned out to be the perfect thing to help polish them off. So, Happy Penuche Dip Day everyone!
See you Monday for National Vanilla Ice Cream Day!
If you’re really interested in learning to bake, I totally recommend Michael Ruhlman’s book Ratio. You’ll learn how to make cookies and cakes without a recipe. You just make one up, based on know the ratios that almost all recipes follow. Seriously!
Um, that sounds awesome actually! “ratio” is the name of the book? It sound almost like a music fake book. Are you saying that you are a success story?