I love toffee. I love it. As I mentioned earlier this week, candy is just tough if you aren’t careful, and I very famously have a deficit in my attention span. Still, the Democratic debate gave me a good opportunity to keep myself busy while everyone tore Mike Bloomberg to confetti. The recipe is super easy (three ingredients minimum) and all it takes is patience (which, admittedly, I have very little of).
Still, as much as I’ve struggled with making candy, here is the very easy and very buttery toffee.
1 cup sugar
1 cup unsalted butter (melted)
1/2 cup milk chocolate chips
1 tsp. kosher salt (optional)
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract (optional)
Take a baking dish and lay parchment paper or aluminum foil inside. With some vegetable oil, grease up the paper/foil.
Put a heavy-bottomed aluminum pan over medium-high heat. Add the sugar and the butter, along with the salt if you’re using it (I recommend it). Stir until the sugar is dissolved and then put your candy thermometer in the mixture.
Let it boil, getting up to 300 degrees F (hard crack temperature). Stir occasionally, but don’t disturb the mixture too much. Once it’s there, remove the pan from the heat.
Add the vanilla and stir until it’s mixed in. Then pour the mixture into your baking dish. Let it start to cool, and it will harden as it does.
After it begins to cool and harden, pour the chocolate chips over the candy and use a spatula to spread it around. It will still be warm enough that the chocolate melts as you spread it. (NOTE: If your sugar mixture didn’t combine fully, you’ll end up with a layer of butter sitting on top of your candy mixture. Just take a paper towel and lay it over the top to absorb as much of the excess butter as you can BEFORE you add the chocolate).
Once there is a layer of melted chocolate evenly distributed across the top of the candy, let it cool a while longer before putting it in the fridge for at least two hours.
Pull it out and break it up into smaller pieces. Give as much of it away as you can because you will eat it all otherwise.
Weekend Thoughts
We have now seen a few states come out and reduce or obliterate COVID restrictions. Texas is taking the brunt of the attacks, but Mississippi is following them, and Connecticut is loosening restrictions somewhat. North Carolina will be reducing them a month from now. Louisiana is going to modified Phase 3.
We are fast approaching the one-year mark of when schools in Louisiana shut down for three weeks (and that three weeks turned into the remainder of the year). We have a ton more information on the virus than we did then. Some things worked, some things didn’t. Some people worked, and some people didn’t.
America’s numbers are not great, but America has done great work in getting multiple vaccines to the market. We have done a hell of a job vaccinating people in our country. The process of getting shots into arms wasn’t perfect, but we’ve learned on the job.
This isn’t a political thing. This is an American thing. We have this amazing ability to adapt and overcome. That is ultimately what makes us great, regardless of the party in power.
We are almost through this pandemic, folks. Take a moment and celebrate that.