Burnt Almonds
Burnt almonds © kvalifood.com
Video recipe - A classic from everyone’s childhood. You cannot walk down a shopping street in winter without them being made everywhere. But they are easy to make yourself, and the homemade ones are actually better than the ones you buy.
Ingredients
- 200 g whole almonds with skin (3 dl)
- 200 g sugar
- 3/4 dl water
Directions
Making the syrup
Put everything into a frying pan or a wide pot.
Heat at medium-high to high heat until the sugar and water turns into a syrup.
Continue cooking until all the water has evaporated from the syrup and it turns back into sugar.
Caramelizing
When the sugar starts to melt, turn the heat down a little so the sugar and almonds don’t burn as easily.
Keep heating the sugar and almonds until the sugar melts and turns more and more brown.
Turn the almonds constantly with a palette knife. Keep taking the almonds from the bottom of the pan and bringing them to the top.
You really cannot overdo it. A short break in the turning and everything can be ruined. If the sugar melts too much it cannot stick to the almonds.
You can theoretically add a bit more sugar to the melted sugar for another chance, but then you have to dig the new sugar out of the drawer, and you still have no guarantee it will work.
As soon as almost all the almonds have a thin layer of browned sugar on them, tip the almonds onto something heat-resistant.
Use the palette knife, spoon or whatever you have been using to make sure there are no large lumps of almonds and sugar. Once they cool down they are almost impossible to separate.
Let them cool until you can touch them with your fingers, then break up the small clusters.
They can be eaten as soon as you can stand to have them in your mouth.
Notes
Starting with the syrup reduction is not strictly necessary, but it gives the almonds a better roasted quality. It improves both the taste and the texture, and is what is missing from the shop-bought ones.
If it all goes wrong - the sugar melts too much, burns, or the almonds burn - don’t despair. It only takes 5 minutes to make a new batch.