Homemade Salted Caramel

Ah, caramel.

How beautiful thou art, but oh! how elusive.

I seem to never have caramel in my house. Being sixteen, I don’t have my full license yet, so usually if I need an ingredient, I have to beg one of my parents to go out and buy it for me, or do without it. Or make it myself.

Making homemade caramel was actually on my December bucket list, but I never got the chance to actually do it. Since it’s spring break for me, I have a list of things to get accomplished this week, and this was #1 🙂 I’m actually so proud of myself, first of all that I actually made myself make it , second that I didn’t even burn it! I actually sat there for about three and a half minutes, staring at the finished product. Caramel is fricking gorgeous. I dreamt about caramel that night (maybe because I made it at like 12:30pm, right before going to bed).

The trick was watching as the sugar melted to make sure it didn’t burn. It changes color really fast, and I mean really fast, and I was a little unprepared. So be prepared!!

You start off heating a cup of sugar in a saucepan, whisking it constantly until it is completely melted. It melts slowly at first, then very quickly, until it smells like caramel and turns a dark amber color. I didn’t use my candy thermometer because I was panicking as it changed color and didn’t want to burn the sugar, but it should read 350 degrees F.

Then add the butter and whisk until it is all melted. Remove the pan from the heat and slowly drizzle in the heavy cream and sprinkle in the salt, whisking until it is smooth.

And now for some salted caramel porn.

Fricking. Gorgeous.

Homemade Salted Caramel from Brown Eyed Baker

Ingredients

1 cup sugar
6 tbs butter, room temperature, cut into small pieces
1/2 cup heavy cream, room temperature
1 1/2 tsp salt

Heat sugar in a heavy saucepan over medium-high heat, whisking until it melts completely.
When the melted sugar is a dark amber color and a candy thermometer reads 350 degrees, add the butter all at once and whisk until it has all melted. The color change happens very quickly, so be careful!
Remove from heat and slowly add the heavy cream. Whisk until smooth, then incorporate in salt.
Cool for 15 minutes. Store in a glass jar or other container in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.

Conclusions:

For the first time making caramel, this was a dream. Besides freaking out when the sugar was melting and changing color, I really had no problems. The taste is exactly like storebought caramels. After being refrigerated, the caramel thickens a great deal and is extremely sticky, but goes back to being liquidy (and still sticky) when heated. This will definitely become my go-to caramel recipe. I’m actually so excited…I can make salted caramel hot chocolate, salted caramel frosting, salted caramel cookies… gosh do I love caramel.