Yesterday I decided to play with Christmas candy.  I know, I know, I have Thanksgiving to plan and I’m getting ahead of myself and thinking of the Christmas Candy.  What can I say- it has cooled down a lot, and the idea of working with hot sugar is strangely appealing to me.  I really want to make some truffles actually, but it’s not cold enough for that yet.  I need my garage to be almost-freezing for molding chocolate shells, so that one is going to have to wait.  But the almond roca- that one I can try out.

I’ve had so many problems on and off with this stuff- but it’s my most requested piece of candy.  The buttery, crisp almond toffee is on everyone’s wish list, and there’s been years where I just have not gotten it right.  So I thought I should start early.

I got out my large stainless steel pot and got my sugar mixture to work. I added the almonds at the right time, and a short while later, that familiar smell was wafting up from the pot.  And before long, it wasn’t wafting, it was coming out at full force, and my candy was burning.  I didn’t get it.  Why does this keep happening with my toffee?  I think it was the pan, actually.  I think that stainless steel is just not getting the job done.  So the first batch went into the garbage, and I pulled out my 2-quart non-stick pot to use that.  This meant scaling the recipe down a touch, and then, as long as I’d already put one batch in the trash, I remembered that I wanted to play with adding some corn syrup to the toffee, to see if that helped ease the candy-making in any way.

So I did that.  I added 2 tablespoons of corn syrup to my batch with the butter and water, and then proceeded with the rest of it.  When I poured it out onto my foil-lined and greased baking sheet, I knew I had a winner.  There wasn’t even a hint of burnt smell or flavor to it, and the toffee spread just like it should.  I used some Ghirardelli milk chocolate to top it, and waited very impatiently for the candy to cool.  As did my children-who love this stuff as much as I do!  One snap of the toffee, and I knew I had a winner.  First of all, the non-stick pot worked perfectly, it kept the toffee moving in the pot instead of sitting in one place burning to the pan.  (I just need a bigger pot for bigger batches!)  Secondly, I really think the corn syrup helped stabilize the whole mixture as well.  It kept the sugars from burning and the butter from separating, and it didn’t seem to me to affect the flavor or the texture.  This is some fine almond roca!   So here’s the updated small-batch recipe the way I made it.  If you have a decent pot (not stainless steel!) and a good thermometer, you should try this out, it’s so delicious, everyone on your Christmas list is going to want some!

Almond Roca

1 stick of butter, cut into chunks

1/4 cup water

2 tablespoons light corn syrup

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup sliced almonds

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 cup chopped milk chocolate

2 tablespoons sliced almonds, chopped up

Line a baking sheet with heavy duty foil and spray with cooking spray, grease with butter, or use a sheet of release foil that doesn’t need any greasing.

Place the butter, water, corn syrup and salt in a 2-quart non-stick saucepan.  Turn the heat on to medium, and heat until the butter is melted, stirring from time to time.  Once the butter has completely melted, add the sugar.  Turn the heat up just a smidge (not quite medium-high), and clip a candy thermometer onto the pot.

Cook to 240ºF.  Stir it a few times while it’s heating, but you don’t need to constantly stir at this point.  The mixture will bubble up a bit, but then it will settle down as it cooks longer.  Once the temperature hits 240ºF, add the 1/2 cup almonds.  Now you need to stir pretty constantly.

Cook and stir the almond mixture to 290ºF.  Don’t be tempted to turn the heat up, you want this to rise up nice and slow, but it shouldn’t take any longer than 15 minutes or so.

As soon as your mixture hits 290ºF, remove the pot from the heat and stir in the baking soda.  Carefully, pour the mixture onto the prepared baking sheet.  If desired, pick up the sheet and tip it from side to side to spread the mixture around, but don’t spread it with the spoon or anything.

After the mixture has cooled five minutes, sprinkle the chopped milk chocolate on the top.  Let that sit for about two minutes, after which it will have completely melted and softened.  Spread the chocolate around to cover the toffee.  Sprinkle the melted chocolate with the chopped almonds and allow the candy to cool completely and the chocolate to set.