Chocolate Truffles with Kahlua and Pecans: This Is a Keeper

We've been savory for far too long here on Take One Cookbook... (Yes, I'm conveniently forgetting the week of Jell-O.) It's time for something decadent, something sweet from A Little Something to help you roll into the holiday weekend.

And, really, when you're looking for decadent and sweet, nothing fits the bill quite so nicely as a boozy homemade truffle. They are really, really, really easy to make, but you don't have to let anyone know that. Just like in that old Rice Krispies commercial where the mom makes a big deal about making rice cereal marshmallow treats and the family believes that they were the hardest thing to make in the world, the ultimate expression of maternal love.

No offense meant to said marshmallow cereal squares -- they really are darned tasty. Heck, I had an R.A. back at American University who was completely mystified by my ability to crank out Rice Krispie Treats.

He'd be gobsmacked by today's recipe -- you, too, can leave people dumbfounded.

Chocolate Truffles with Kalua and Pecans

These elegant chocolates are a perfect accompaniment to your favorite coffee or espresso. 

Makes 25

3/4 cup whipping cream
1 1/2 cups (12 ounces) semisweet chocolate bars, finely chopped
2 tablespoons Kahlua
1 1/4 cups finely chopped pecans

1. Line an 8-inch-square baking pan with foil. Set aside.
2. Bring the cream to a simmer, remove from the heat, and whisk in the chocolate until smooth and melted.
3. Whisk in the Kahlua. Pour the mixture into the prepared pan and freeze about 30 minutes, until just firm.
4. Cut the chocolate into 25 squares. Pour the nuts into a small bowl. Coat each square with nuts and roll into a ball.
5. Place the chocolates on a small baking sheet and chill until firm, at least 2 hours. Serve cold.

Try some of these combinations:

• Substitute Grand Marnier for the Kahlua.

• Substitute almonds or hazelnuts for the pecans.

If you made up a batch of kaluha a few weeks back, you can certainly use it here.

You also don't have to step near the stove. Really! Heat up that cream in the microwave, and you'll have an easier time all around. Don't even think of touching a double boiler.

If you're sharing these with people who might have nut allergies, for the love of all things, do not put nuts in your truffles. You can replace the nuts with crushed vanilla wafers, or even some puffed rice cereal. If you go the Krispie route, I'd recommend melting up some more chocolate in the microwave so that you can coat the truffles and make them extra pretty.

Exiled No More: Hot Spicy Candy

The Midatlantic section of The County Fair Cookbook has more than its fair share of interesting-looking recipes. It made selecting just one very difficult. Finally, I got it narrowed down to Wickham Family Pickled Cherries, or Hot Spicy Candy. The candy won out, mostly because the recipe is longer, and, well, I'm a fool for candy, and the method seems less prone to error than others. If you've a hankering for easy preserving of sour cherries, however, drop a comment, and I'll post the cherries.

The Sussex County Farm & Horse Show takes place the first week of August, most years, in Augusta, New Jersey. It's one of the larger fairs in the Northeast, evidently. Jane Brodhecker raises lambs, and though I love me some lamb, it's her candy recipe that makes me go "ooo."

Hot Spicy Candy
"The recipe comes from my Indiana grandmother," says Jane. "We made this candy with our children, and now they make it with theirs. Before Christmas everybody comes to the farm and we make batches together in several flavors. We use red coloring for cinnamon candy, black for anise, and purple for spearmint. Then we mix them and put them in airtight containers for gifts. The procedure sounds complicated, but making this candy is really simple." Flavored oils -- cinnamon, anise, wintergreen and others -- can be found at many pharmacies and sometimes at specialty food shops. Intense fruit flavorings are good, too. Paste coloring agents are sold at bakers' supplies stores and craft shops.

Makes about 4 cups

3 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1 1/2 cups light corn syrup
1 cup water
Paste or liquid pure food coloring
1 dram (scant teaspoon) oil of cinnamon, clove or peppermint, or fruit flavoring
2 pounds confectioners' sugar (see Note

1. Place the sugar, syrup and water in a large saucepan. Bring slowly to the boil, with a candy thermometer attached to the side of the pan. Heat the mixture to exactly 290 degrees. (This will take 15 to 20 minutes.) Higher, the candy sets too hard; short of 290, it won't set up. Remove from the heat and add the desired color. Paste colors are intense; a dab on a toothpick should give a deep color. Be careful with liquid colors -- too much may dilute the candy mixture and impede setting.
2. Stir in the oil flavoring. Stand back! The mixture steams up and releases strong fumes.
3. Have ready 3 jelly roll pans on which you have places a 3/4-inch-thick fluffy layer of confectioners' sugar. With a finger, trace a large spiral trough in each pan.
4. Carefully pour the liquid into the troughs -- the little walls of confectioners' sugar keep it from spreading. When the candy has hardened and is cool enough to touch -- a matter of minutes -- take scissors and snip it into short pieces, or snap off pieces with your fingers. Roll them in the sugar. Sealed in containers, the candy lasts for months.
NOTE: You can reuse the confectioners' sugar. Between candy-making bouts, store the sugar in a self-sealing plastic bag.

...damn, that DOES sound easy! And far less apt to leave you with hard candy that tastes either of butter or vegetable oil, which always happens to me when I try to make lollipops and I have to grease the molds...

I wonder a bit at the order of the steps, and suggest that you make sure you do the prep for step 3 before you get anything else going. At least do it well before you've got a pot of fully molten sugar and oil ready.

I love old fashioned candy flavors. When I was in Salem, Massachusetts, I practically ran to Ye Olde Pepper Candy Companie to stock up on anise and clove candies. I'll admit: most people I know don't care for anise or clove candy. Poor souls! The spiciness combines with the sweet? Delightful! So much more interesting than sweet-on-sweet. Then again, I also love licorice (especially salted licorice), and absinthe, so I may just be a weirdo. And fennel! Love fennel.

After my buttered lollies failures, I'd pretty much sworn off hard candy making. The sugar trough method may bring me back from my candy land exile.

Candied Citrus Peel

What do the lebkuchen and brandied fruitcake drops have in common? Besides both being from Christmas 101, that is.

The use of candied citrus peels.

In fact, a lot of holiday recipes call for candied citrus peel of one kind or another (or, heck, in combination). Moreover, you can dip candied citrus peel (I'd call it CCP, but that's just one C short of the Soviet Union, and I'd have weird cognitive issues with that) in melted chocolate and give it out as presents to your neighbors, coworkers, and holiday hosts and hostesses. Yes, really! Honestly! Homemade goodies are a great thing to bring to parties, and this one doesn't take long at all.

Candied Citrus Peels

Makes about 3/4 pound

Make ahead: The candied peels must stand overnight before rolling in sugar. They can then be stored, in an airtight container at room temperature, for up to 1 month.

2 medium grapefruits
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar plus additional for coating
1/3 cup light corn syrup

1. Using a sharp knife, cut off the tops and bottoms of the grapefruits so they can stand. Cut off the rinds in thick, wide strips where the rind meets the fruit. Cut the rind into long strips about 1/2 inch wide. Place in a medium saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce the heat to medium and cook at a gentle boil for 5 minutes. Drain and rinse under cold running water. Return to the pan, cover with water, and repeat the procedure.

2. In a medium saucepan, bring the sugar, corn syrup, and 1 1/4 cups water to a boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Add the peels and reduce the heat to medium-low. Simmer until the peels are translucent and tender, 20 to 30 minutes. Drain the peels. Arrange the peels, not touching each other, on a wire cake rack set over a baking sheet. Let stand at room temperature overnight. Roll the peels in additional sugar to coat. (The candied peels can be prepared up to 1 month ahead, stored in an airtight container at room temperature.)

Do you hate grapefruit? I do. Oh, don't get me wrong... give me a nice can of Fresca, with its chemically wonderfulness, and "grapefruit flavor" will be okay. But when it comes to citrus, grapefruit just isn't my thing.

If you're like me, you can substitute 3 oranges, or 4 lemons for the grapefruit. The peels for either of these fruits will need longer simmering times -- 30 to 40 minutes.

And, heck, if you're feeling frolicsome, you can substitute other citrus, too. Try lime. Try... bergamot. Try whatever floats your candying boat. Just remember to simmer until translucent and tender.

Dollars to donuts, what ever you try, it's going to end up tasting a damned sight better than the mass-processed crud you can get in the supermarket.

Divinity

Filbert brittle makes me think of Grandma G. But divinity? Divinity makes me think of Grandma B. I don't have many memories of Grandma B. that come from just-me, as opposed to other people's stories. See, she died when I was just about 3 years old, and the times we'd gone up to Portland to visit, I'd been going to doctor's appointments. My sister got to stay with Grandma, and so has many more direct memories of her. I do remember her holiday candy tray, though, and, especially, the divinity.

The Farm Journal's Homemade Candy offers up the following basic divinity recipe (and several variations that make buying the book well worth your $2):

Divinity
Sells fast at food bazaars

2 1/4 c. sugar
1/3 c. white corn syrup
1/4 tsp. salt
1/3 c. water
2 egg whites
1 tsp. vanilla
2/3 c. chopped pecans or walnuts

Place sugar, corn syrup, and water in a 2-qt. heavy saucepan; cook and stir over high heat until sugar is dissolved. Continue cooking without stirring over medium heat until syrup reaches the hard ball stage (255°). Wipe off any sugar crystals that form on sides of pan.

Meanwhile, beat egg whites until stiff. Pour hot syrup slowly over egg whites and beat on medium speed of mixer until candy fluffs up. Add vanilla and continue beating on medium speed, or by hand, until mixture begins to lose its gloss and a small amount dropped from a spoon holds soft peaks. (If the candy gets too stiff for the mixer, complete the beating with a wooden spoon.) Fold in nuts.

Working quickly, drop candy by teaspoonfuls onto waxed paper or turn into lightly buttered 8" square pan. If divinity becomes too stiff, stir in a few drops of hot water. Makes about 24 pieces or 1 pound.

Have I mentioned this week that you really, really, truly need to have a decent candy thermometer? You do. Cooking with sugar is all about the temperature, and though you could technically figure out what stage you're at by dropping bits into cold water and then manipulating it, that takes time, and isn't as accurate. Get a candy thermometer. It will make this much easier.

My mom gave me a Betty Crocker cookbook (which I'm sure to feature on Take One Cookbook at some point) when I went off to college. She wrote on the divinity page "do not make on a rainy day." Divinity and humidity do not go well together. Homemade Candy suggests that if you beat the divinity enough, you'll manage just fine. And by "enough," I mean that it could take up to 15 minutes. No, really. If you thought about trying this without a mechanized mixer, the time to rethink that is now.

If you want to do dropped-from-spoons divinity, have a partner, or it's going to set up on you. I remember divinity cut into squares, so I'm guessing that Grandma B. always poured it into a pan. She didn't lack for helpers, mind you; Mom is one of 7 children. But, still, if you've got hot sugar and 7 kids under foot, the quicker path is probably the wiser one.

Unless you're dealing with a taffy pull. Homemade Candy will walk you through that, too. Pick up a copy, and let me know how your creations turn out.

I feel like I should say that, growing up, I always assumed that the Turkish Delight that the White Witch fed Edmund was, in fact, divinity. What else would lead a child to betray his family? It's that good.

Homemade Marshmallows

Nowadays, nearly every culinary or family magazine will give you a recipe for homemade marshmallows, but back in 1970, when The Farm Journal's Homemade Candy came out, marshmallows in the U.S. came in a plastic bag at the grocers. They were meant to be put in fruit salad, or melted on top of sweet potatoes, or really really melted in with margarine to coat Rice Krispies for a Treat. I adore marshmallows (even the mass produced kind), and encourage you to give 'em a go in your own kitchen.

Homemade Marshmallows
Light, delicate and delicious

2 tblsp. unflavored gelatin
3/4 c. cold water
2 c. sugar
1/8 tsp. salt
3/4 c. boiling water
1 tblsp. vanilla
Chopped nuts or toasted flaked coconut for coating

Soften gelatin in cold water 5 minutes; then dissolve by stirring over hot water.

Combine sugar, salt and boiling water in 2-qt. heavy saucepan; cook, stirring utnil sugar dissolves, to the soft crack stage (280°).

Pour into mixing bowl along with the gelatin mixture and beat at low speed for 3 minutes; continue beating at medium speed for 10 minutes or until mixture is fluffy and creamy. Add vanilla and pour into an 8" square pan dusted with confectioners sugar.

Cool 1/2 hour or until set, then cut in 36 squares with knife moistened in water. Roll in nuts or coconut. Place in airtight container and put in refrigerator, freezer or other cold place until ready to use. Makes about 1 pound.

Note: Tint the gelatin mixture while heating -- pale green, pink, or yellow -- if you wish. Roll green candy in chopped nuts, pink in flaked coconut, yellow in toasted coconut and white in nuts or coconut. You can vary the flavorings if you wish. Instead of vanilla use almound, peppermint, orange or lemon extract.

In case it's not 100% clear, do NOT use these magnificent beasties for your Rice Krispie Treat needs. These are to be savored on their own.

I'm generally pro-nut, but don't think that nuts really pair well with an otherwise unadorned marshmallow. If you're going to enrobe the nut-crusted 'mallow with chocolate, well, ... maybe. But otherwise, please keep them plain, or dusted in confectioner's sugar, or, yes, use that coconut. Personally, I'd tint the coconut and leave the marshmallows white.

Instead of using a knife to cut the marshmallow into pieces, try using kitchen shears. You'll manage the task much more quickly, and with greater precision.

What are your favorite uses for marshmallows?

Right about now, I can see plopping a big marshmallow into a cup of hot cocoa, watching it swell, and then nibbling my way to the beverage. Mmmm...marshmallows remind me of childhood.

Filbert Brittle

Though plates of fudge and cookies make me go back in my mind to my mom's family home, there are a few things that make me leap, mentally, to Dad's mom's house. Ribbon candy. Scotch and soda. Dill pickles. Brittle. And nuts.

Grandma always had a wooden bowl filled with nuts in their shells, sitting out on the coffee table. There were nut picks and a nut cracker (which looks surprisingly like what I've seen folks out here use for cracking crab). We would crack and eat nuts all visit long. My favorites were always the filberts.

Mmmm, filberts. For, lo, it was Oregon, and it was the 70s, and they were filberts. The rest of the world might call 'em "hazelnuts," but we knew better. Filbert orchards everywhere, and tasty, tasty filberts, too.

Imagine my surprise when I went to an Oregon wine tasting here in DC, and met the heads of the Oregon HAZELNUT Growers Association. They begged me to not call them filberts anymore. Seems that properly named filberts don't command the same price on the international marked as identical-except-in-name hazelnuts. A bit of me died that night.

Back to Grandma, and memories. The Farm Journal's Homemade Candy has a recipe that combines two of the tastes that make me think of Grandma G.

Unsurpassable Filbert Brittle

Filberts grow in Oregon and candy makers there believe that confections featuring them can't be surpassed. They have a right to be proud of this brittle. If you can't find filberts in your markets, you can use either raw Spanish peanuts or salted peanuts as a substitute in the recipe for Filbert Brittle.

As with all brittle recipes, the trick is to prevent scorching and the formation of sugar crystals during the cooking. This recipe shows the way a home economics teacher controls these problems. All her friends recognize her as an expert candy maker.

She likes to pour the cooked brittle onto a warm marble slab, brushed with mineral oil, but you can use heavy duty foil, well oiled or buttered. To warm the marble, she lays her electric pad on it and turns on the electricity -- an original idea.

Filbert Brittle

A holiday treat in the Northwest -- it's worth adoption across country

4 c. whole or halved filberts
3 c. sugar
1 14/ c. light corn syrup
1 c. boiling water
2 tblsp. butter
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. vanilla

Remove any excess or loose fibers from filberts, but do not remove skins.

Combine sugar, corn syrup, and boiling water in 3-qt. heavy saucepan. Stir until sugar is dissolved, then cover and place over medium heat until syrup boils. Remove lid; insert candy termometer and cook at medium boil to the soft ball stage (240°).

Add filberts all at once. Do not stir until mixture again boils (it might start a crystal). Then stir with a wooden spoon to keep nuts from scorching, using care not to touch sides of pan above surface of syrup, for the friction of spoon may cause crystals to fall into syrup and cause a coarse-grain candy.

Cook to the hard crack stage (310°), or even beyond it to 320°, at which stage sugar caramelizes and turns a dark golden color. Add butter; remove from heat at once. Then add salt, soda and vanilla, stirring in well.

Pour onto warm marble slab, brushed with mineral oil or butter, or onto buttered heavy duty foil. Pour brittle so it spreads out as thinly as possible. Work a buttered or oiled spatula under one side of brittle and turn it over. Pull the brittle as thin as possible. (A heatproof mit is helpful in turning and pulling brittle.)

Let cool; then break in pieces of eating size. Store in airtight containers. Place in freezer, refrigerator or other cold place. Makes 3 pounds.

Do take it to the 320°F point, please, and get the darker, yummier, caramelized sugar. It's so worth it.

I can taste it now. The butter. The burnt sugar. The crisp nuts. How, on a humid day (and, hello, it was Oregon...rainy rainy humid), it would be a bit softer, a bit grainier. Still tasty as all get out.

Butterscotch Haystacks

It's not very often I feature a recipe on Take One Cookbook that I know my sister would not only eat, but also enjoy. She's a very particular eater, and perhaps in a long-standing fit of rebellion ("I CAN be different than my sister!"), I eat pretty much anything. Not eel. Never eel. I have eel issues. Eel... :shudder:

But we're not here to talk about eel. Today or ever.

No, today we're here to talk about Farm Journal's Homemade Candy confection section, and specifically, and easy, adaptable, tasty treat that even my sister will eat.

Butterscotch Haystacks
Crisp and sweet and so easy to make

2 (6 oz.) pkgs. butterscotch-flavored morsels
1 1/2 c. salted cashew nuts
1 (5 oz.) can chow mein noodles

Melt butterscotch bits in top of double boiler, stirring occasionally to blend.

Meanwhile, combine nuts and chow mein noodles; place in preheated low oven (200°). Add warmed nuts and noodles to melted butterscotch and stir until all are coated.

Quickly drop with a dessert spoon onto waxed paper-lined baking sheet to form little haystacks. If nuts and noodles are warmed, butterscotch will not set until all the stacks are spooned out. Makes 48 haystacks, or about 1 pound.

Note: You can substitute 1 1/2 c. salted peanuts for the cashews, if you wish.

I'm here to tell you, you can do this without nuts altogether. Nuts are fine and all, but there's nothing saying they need to be here. Other than the recipe, mind you. But we're all about informed substitution (and deletion) here at Take One Cookbook. You could also use walnuts, or pecans, or whatever nut you like. Here's my suggestion: A big ol' spoonful of peanut butter, put in with the butterscotch chips when you melt them. Mmmm, nutty taste and no nut chunks to distract from the texture of the chow mein. (I may have been influenced by my big sister in some food preferences, after all.)

Here's an informed substitution I recommend you make whichever side of the nut equation you land on: lose the double boiler. Melt in a microwave-safe glass bowl, 1 minute at first and then in 15 second bursts, stirring between, until all melted. So. much. easier. than using a double boiler.

Besides putting something sweet, nutty, crunchy, and easy on your cookie and candy plate for the holidays, this post is also an introduction to my big sister, Kelly, who has guest blogger credentials for Take One Cookbook. Sometime in the near future, she'll be mining the West Coast family library of cookbooks; I hear she'll start with a boozy book, which makes us all very, very happy, indeed.

Sauerkraut Candy

Be not afraid.

There is no actual sauerkraut in this candy. (Though, let it be known, sauerkraut goes great in sweets, especially in chocolately sauerkraut cake. No, really.)

Trust me. Trust the editors of the Farm Journal's Homemade Candy. This is good stuff.

Sauerkraut Candy Comes Back

Most youngsters never heard of Sauerkraut Candy, but oldsters know it well. The "sauerkraut" is shredded coconut and you team it with penuche. Many grocery stores throughout the Midwest sold it from barrels during the Gay Nineties. It held its place in the sun until World War I. Then for some reason it almost disappeared. Make it once and you may stage a revival, for the candy tastes extra-good.

Sauerkraut Candy
You can't miss with this combination of lots of coconut in penuche

2 c. light brown sugar, firmly packed
2 c. white sugar
1/4 c. light corn syrup
1 1/3 c. dairy half-and-half
1/4 c. butter (1/2 stick)
1/4 tsp. salt
1 tsp. vanilla
1 1/2 c. shredded coconut

Combine sugars, corn syrup and half-and-half in a 3-qt. heavy saucepan with buttered sides. Cooked over medium-high heat, stirring until sugar is dissolved. Continue cooking to the soft ball stage (238 to 240°).

Remove from heat; add butter and salt without stirring. Cool to lukewarm (110°). Add vanilla and beat until creamy; mixture loses gloss and becomes opaque.

Fold in coconut all at once. Pour onto buttered and chilled platter or into an 8" square pan. Cut in slices if thick or in 49 squares if molded in pan. Makes about 2 1/4 pounds.

You may be wondering what the heck penuche is. I'd never heard the word before. Turns out, it's a brown-sugar fudge. I know, I know... fudge overload. But it's more caramel-y than the average fudge; Wikipedia describes some uses:

Penuche is also used as a boiled icing flavor. It was once very popular in Hawaii where the name was localized as Panocha or Panuche. "Panocha" is said to come from the Spanish word for raw sugar. Hawaiian cooks often reminisce about both panocha fudge and icing. As an icing, it was common as topping for prune cake. Other names for Penuche include Noochie and creamy praline fudge.

Ooooo. Oooo, I like the idea of a prune cake, and of a brown sugar fudge-tastic icing. This appeals to my inner Icelandic self, which believes that all winter holidays should have pastries made from prunes (see: family recipe for vinaterta, which I should really post here at some point).

I was stopped in my tracks by the phrase "Gay Nineties"; when did we stop giving decades cute monikers? The Roaring Twenties is the last one that springs easily to mind. Surely we could come up with some more.

I think the author of the recipe pulls a few punches, or is willfully ignoring the obvious. If "for some reason" a recipe with a Germanic name drops from public usage sometime within the lifetime of folks who ate it during the Gay Nineties, it's not a big mystery. It's called The War. Even sauerkraut wasn't called sauerkraut anymore; it became Liberty cabbage.

Coconut is one of those things that I adore, that I know many people loathe, and that I can't understand anyone disliking. It's so mild. So tasty. So delightful. Chefly Husband, thankfully, adores it, even though his father twitches at the mere thought of the shredded horror.

Cheddar Cheese Fudge; No, really.... cheddar cheese fudge!

You've heard about the cookbooks that are all about sneaking something healthy into food for kids. A spoonful of peas in a plate of brownies, or a tablespoon of grated beetroot in a quart of strawberry milkshakes. Those cookbooks just aren't trying hard enough.

The editors of the Food Journal's Homemade Candy manage to get two cups of nutrition into this recipe. Okay, okay, it's not vegetably nutrition, but still. If you have a picky eater in your house or family, or a wealth of cheese, give it a try.

Popular Cheddar Cheese Fudge

Cheese fudge proves the inaccuracy of the old saying that there is nothing new under the sun. When a state supervisor of the school lunch program made some of this candy for one of our food editors, she moved any question there might have been about why the sweet was so popular with youngsters.

One of the splendid features of the candy, loaded with Cheddar cheese and dry milk powder, flavored with butter, vanilla and cocoa, is that the electric mixer does almost all the work. You do not even cook the fudge. It's ideal for serving to a crowed of youngsters. But pass it to grownups, too, for they'll like its creaminess, sweet chocolate flavor and the way it serves as a snack to satisfy appetites.

Cheddar Cheese Fudge

Cheese flavor is subtle in this creamy, no-cook, protein-rich candy

2 c. shredded Cheddar cheese (1/2 lb)
1 c. butter (2 sticks)
1/2 c. cocoa
1 1/2 lbs. confectioners sugar
1 1/2 c. nonfat dry milk powder (1/2 lb.)
1/2 tblsp. vanilla

Have all ingredients at room temperature; combine in large mixer bowl. Beat until creamy (it may be necessary to moisten mixture with 1/4 c. whole milk).

Put in buttered 9" square pan; chill. When firm, cut candy in 64 squares. Makes about 3 1/2 pounds.

Note: Drained maraschino cherries, flaked coconut, miniature marshmallows or chopped nuts may be added.

...I'm fascinated and appalled, all at once. That's a heck of a lot of cheese, and anything with that much cheese is appealing. Part of me wants to try it out with my 5 year old niece. She's not a cheese eater (the shame!), but she's a great kitchen helper. If you ever need anything added to your mixer bowl, call on Meg. I think she'd enjoy making this, and might even (gasp) eat it, too. At the very least, she could make a plate to give to her fudge-loving grandpa.

Most of my fudge memories are from family celebrations when I was a kid in the 70s. There were always plates of sweets, and the little squares of homemade fudge were my favorites (right up there with thumbprint cookies). Normally, I wouldn't do two such similar recipes from one book, but ... fudge! Fudge for the holidays! There's time enough for sauerkraut candy, divinity, brittles and the like later on this week.

Honey Toffee Pennies

Nowadays, you'd be hard-pressed to find a kids' cookbook that even considered encouraging the kids to boil sugar. Boiling sugar = danger, danger, danger. Plus, candy making is usually viewed as a highly-precise, needs-special-equipment sort of affair, ill-suited to the novice.

The Pooh Cook Book is either more ambitious or more foolhardy than you might expect.

Honey Toffee Pennies

1/4 cup (2 ounces) butter, sliced
3/4 cup honey
1 1/4 cups brown sugar, firmly packed
1 Tablespoon cider vinegar
1 heavy-bottomed saucepan
1 after-dinner coffee spoon
   or
1 quarter-teaspoon measuring spoon

Choose one of these flavorings for each batch of toffee:
6-7 drops extract of mint
   or
1/4 teasppon of one of these:
powdered cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger
   or
Juice of 1/2 lemon

Put the butter, honey, sugar, and vinegar in the heavy-bottomed saucepan. The saucepan must have a heavy bottom or the toffee will burn.

Keep over low heat until mixture has melted.

Stir and increase the heat.

Boil without stirring at high heat for
   10 minutes for chewy toffee;
   15 minutes for hard toffee;
   20 minutes for brittle toffee;

Add the flavoring when you remove the saucepan from the head, while candy is still boiling.

Honey toffee tastes good at every stage, so it doesn't matter whether you boil it for ten minutes or more. What matters is not to stir it.

Drip the honey toffee from a small spoon into penny shapes onto a dish or a piece of plastic or Pliofilm or wax paper. If you are very clever, you will be able to drip it from the spoon in all kinds of shapes -- clouds and snails and beetles and birds as well as Pooh shapes.

Or you can drip it from the spoon in small blobs and wait until it cools, so that you can shape it with your hands into balls or little squares or rectangles.

A good trick to keep the toffee liquid is to put the saucepan with the toffee in a larger pan of hot water. You won't have to work quite so fast if you keep the toffee hot and liquid.

The 15- and 20- minute toffee gets harder the longer it sits. When hard enough, wrap in plastic or wax paper and store in an airtight container.

And the only reason for making honey is so as I can eat it."
-- Winnie-the-Pooh

Pliofilm, it seems, was a brand name for a competitor of Cellophane. It played a role in the Allied invasion of Normandy. And you could use it for candy making! Except for the pesky "it contributed to leukemia" part... Let's stick with wax paper, shall we?

I've only tried to make hard candy once; I was sure that homemade lollipops would be delightful. They weren't... they tasted of the butter that I put on the molds, and not at all like sweet little nuggets of fruity delight.

Toffee, though, is supposed to be buttery. So this might well be worth a shot, especially because it seems to be completely unfussy. No thermometer. No firm amount of time.