The original English toffee was made by slowly cooking the sugar and butter mixture until it reached the perfect caramelized consistency.
INGREDIENTS
- 2 1/4 cups (450 g) light brown sugar
- 3/4 cup (175 ml) water
- 1 cup (225 g) salted butter, cut into pieces, plus more for buttering the pan
- A pinch of cream of tartar, optional
- 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon lemon extract
DIRECTIONS
- Prepare a 9x13 inch (23x33 cm) heatproof dish. You can either follow the historical recipe to the letter and just butter the dish well, but you’ll have an easier time getting the toffee out of the pan if you butter it and line it with parchment paper.
- Butter the inside of a large saucepan. Honestly, I’m not sure if this really does anything, but it’s in the historical recipe. I’m pretty sure you can skip this without anything terrible happening.
- Stir together the brown sugar and water in the pan, then put the pan over low heat and stir. The sugar should dissolve to make a syrup in about 5 to 8 minutes, and as soon as it starts to steam, add in the butter. Stir to help the butter melt. At this point, you can stir in a bit of cream of tartar to help prevent crystallization. Some professional recipes from the time included this, but this particular recipe didn’t. Once the butter has melted, stop stirring and put a candy thermometer on the pot.
- Keep the heat low while the candy heats. Once it hits around 220°F (105°C), it will slow or even stop rising in temperature, but keep it on low heat, and it will start to rise again. This can take about 30 minutes. You want the temperature to reach 300-310°F (150°C), or the hard crack stage.
- Take the pot off the heat and stir in the lemon extract, then pour the toffee into the prepared pan. Let the toffee cool and set up, about 10 minutes.
- When the toffee has set up, take it out of the pan and break it up into pieces, then serve it forth.
