spiced whiskey & apple caramels

Need a stocking stuffer, secret santa, party favour or just general emergency gift? A bag of juicy, spicy and slightly boozy caramels fit the bill nicely. And they are very quick to throw together for any festive crisis you encounter. They keep for a couple weeks in an airtight container + parchment wrappers at room temperature. 

Candy making is slightly intimidating, it needs a bit of precision and it can also hurt you real bad. Sugar burns are awful, so please be very careful adding things to boiling sugar and pouring the caramels. Also, I highly recommend not setting your sugar on fire, setting off all the smoke alarms, alarming & annoying the other building residents, having to call the charming fire-people to come turn the stupid thing off and ruining a perfectly good pan, as I did once making caramel. Just stay there and watch your caramel like a hawk. Despite these potential stumbling blocks, candy making is pretty easy if you have a reliable thermometer and lots of fun. 

Adapted from Bon Appetit

• 2 cinnamon sticks
• 2 cups apple juice, preferably cloudy
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• ½ cup heavy cream
• 5 tbs butter
• 1 teaspoon flaky sea salt
• 4 tbs spiced whiskey
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Line an 8"x8" square pan with parchment. 

Combine juice, sugars and cinnamon in a medium pan and cook on high heat until mixture registers 280° on a candy thermometer. Remove from heat and and cream butter and salt. The sugar will bubble up-be careful. Return to heat until mixture reaches 250°. Add whiskey and vanilla. Pour caramel into prepared pan and chill until firm. 

Slice into small rectangles and wrap in parchment squares. 

Photos: Tyrel Hiebert 

mini sticky toffee puddings

If you are casting around for a Christmas dessert, or what to serve at any upcoming holiday party, may I suggest mini sticky toffee puddings. Sticky toffee pudding is alchemy. It consists of a date cake soaked in a buttery toffee sauce, but the flavour combination transcends the fairly humble ingredients it's made from. It doesn't really have any showy, braggart ingredients, nothing hard to source or especially expensive. But the combination is almost magically greater than the sum of its parts. I'm not exaggerating, it's transcendent.

My family have been having STP as Christmas dessert for a few years and we have always made it in the traditional way, in a big pan. To increase toffee sauce-cake permeation I poked lots of holes in the cake with a skewer, hoping get the sauce really soaked in there. But I thought that creating a larger surface area for sauce contact would really help them get thoroughly sauced. I used a miniature bun to bake these and the little nooks and crannies really catch the toffee sauce.  If you don't have a mini bundt pan, use a muffin tin or a 8" round cake pan, increasing the baking time to around 50 minutes. 

Note: Both puddings and sauce freeze very well. Just reheat sauce and cakes when thawed in a 350° oven.  

Adapted from Martha Stewart

date cake

• 1/2 cup  butter, room temperature
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour and extra for the pans
• 8 ounces pitted dates, finely chopped
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Butter and flour the mini bundt pans or whichever pans you will use. Heat oven to 250° F.

Boil a kettle and combine chopped dates with 1/2 cup boiling water in a small bowl. Cover with a lid or plate and set aside. Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a bowl. 

Cream butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy and add eggs one at a time, beating well after each. Blitz the soaked dates in a food processor until a chunky paste forms. Add flour mixture, date paste and vanilla to mixer bowl and mix on medium until just combined, making sure to scrape the bottom. 

Using an ice cream scoop fill bundt pans 2/3 of the way full. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean. I found that they released from the pan best when they were still hot. Wiggle a toothpick around the edge of the pans to help unstick them, and pull them gently away from the edge with your fingers once they are cool enough to not burn you. Once they are pretty loose, pry em out.

toffee sauce

• 1 cup butter
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

Combine all ingredients over low heat in a small saucepan. Simmer about 10 minutes. 

To serve, pour warm sauce over mini puds, and add a little bit of cream or ice cream if you like. 

Photos: Tyrel Hiebert

toffee with pecans and smoked salt

I'm working on few recipes for food gifts that I can make and package for Christmas presents. This pecan toffee is definitely on the list. They are pretty quick and easy to make and very tasty. They store well, so you can make them a little in advance if you wish. Store them in the fridge or somewhere cool. 

pecan toffee

pecan smoked salt toffee:

• 1/2 cup sugar

• 1/2 cup butter

• 2 tbs water

• 1 cup pecan halves, toasted and chopped if you wish

• 1/2 tsp vanilla

• a big pinch or two high quality smoked salt

Melt together water, butter and sugar over medium high heat. Stir constantly until mixture begins to turn golden. Watch the mixture closely; it can burn very quickly. Add pecans and vanilla and stir to combine. 

If you want to make a sheet of toffee with pecans in it, pour

 the mixture onto a parchment lined baking sheet. If you want pecan praline style clusters like the above photo, empty the pan out onto a cooling rack with a parchment lined sheet underneath in. Separate the pecans into little clusters with a spatula. Either way, sprinkle the toffee with a big pinch of smoked salt before it cools. 

Smash the toffee into bits, divide between small, airtight containers. Try not to eat it all before you give it away. Unless you want to.

Finely chop up the toffee to swirl through ice cream or sprinkle onto a cake

Photo credit:

Tyrel Hiebert