The blog of Oh Sweet Day!
My relation to golfing, or my husband’s obsession with golfing is awful. Part of the reason is because I don’t find watching golf entertaining. What I see is a few guys walking on a large green and…oh! That’s all! That’s all I can see on any golfing games. If I am lucky, I might be able to see a tiny white dot flying across the sky. But that’s very rare.
My all-time favourite home-made foodie gift is English toffee. It’s buttery and nutty. And if you are a fan of Almond Roca, you will fall for it. Same as English coffee, honeycomb brittle is so simple to make, and it’s another perfect gift to take to a dinner party. Better than chocolate, which people tend to nicely smile at, but put away in a cabinet, either forget about it very soon or keep thinking whom it should be given away to.
Honeycomb brittle tastes like Crunchie Bar. It has an interesting airy texture caused by adding baking soda into hot syrup. The bubbles created are trapped to form a crisp, light and melt-in-your-mouth candy. And the holes in the candy give it a honeycomb appearance.
You can have the brittle on its own. But since it’s sort of a light candy, it’s less guilty to make it more awesome. I dipped the cool candy in melted dark chocolate to make it more scrumptious and impressive. Although most of my friends and family who tasted it had a hard time telling what exactly it was, they went, “OH MY GOD! It’s so good. What is it? How did you make it?” I know, who really cares what it is!
Ingredients (about 20 pieces):
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/4 cup corn syrup
1 tablespoon honey
1/4 cup water
1 tablespoon baking soda
800 gram dark chocolate
Directions:
Prepare a large baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
Bring sugar, corn syrup, honey and water to a boil in a medium saucepan, stirring constantly. Reduce heat to low. Cook, without stirring, until a candy thermometer reaches 300 degrees.
Remove from heat, and whisk in baking soda until combined and mixture bubbles. When it has almost stopped bubbling, gently and quickly pour mixture onto the prepared baking sheet without spreading. Let cool. Break into pieces.
Melt chocolate. Use a fork to dip each piece of brittle into the chocolate. Lightly tap the fork to remove any excess. Use a pairing knife to push the brittle off the fork and onto the baking sheet.
Place the brittle into the refrigerator for 10 minutes and let the chocolate harden.
I think my pie making evolution has started after I fell in love with these shortbread cookies. They are crumbly, buttery and really simple to make. Since then I decided to turn my pie crusts into shortbread crusts, and kinda gave up the pate brisee, the classic shortcrust pastry, except for lattice pie.
This is a recipe for you if you have way too many egg whites left in the refrigerator and you have no idea what to do with them. At least for me, who has been insanely making home made ice cream and ice cream cake with egg yolks, thanks to the lovely ice cream maker.
Today is Pick a Strawberry Day. Did you know that? I didn’t. But isn’t it cute that there is a day reserved to celebrate such a sweet and fun activity?! And according to these interesting facts, ancient pregnant women believed if they ate strawberries their children would be born with strawberry birth marks. Funny!