Thursday, October 13, 2011

Delux Caramel Apples


I just made these yummy caramel apples as gifts for some friends.  My son's eyes nearly popped out when he saw them.  They are a great gift that wont break the bank and in my opinion, the best kind of gifts are the ones you can eat.  I think they are especially nice in the fall since you can get the best apples now.

Simple caramel apples are very straight forward:

-  Wash and dry your apples thoroughly
-  Melt caramel in a sauce pan with a tablespoon of water, stir often (I burnt mine a little which you can see, but you can't taste those little dark marks...plus I then covered them with chocolate so it really didn't matter
-  Remove caramel from heat and dip (reheat if caramel becomes too thick)
-  Place caramel apples on parchment paper and allow to cool


Bags of caramel often come with the popsicle sticks.  Since these are gifts, I wanted to make them a little nicer so I purchase round wood candy apple sticks at a candy making store.  After dipping the apples in caramel I then drizzled them with milk chocolate melting chocolate.  I melted the chocolate in a one cup glass measuring cup with a spout.  The spout allows you to get the thin drizzle.  It works best if you hold the measuring cup about a foot away from the apple when drizzling since it gives you a thinner stream of chocolate.  While the chocolate was still wet I sprinkled the apples with crushed butterfinger bar.  I put them in fridge to cool and then drizzled them a second time with white chocolate.  Refrigerating them causes the chocolate to get a nice shinny surface.  If you let them cool on the counter the chocolate may appear dull when it hardens.



I think four layers (caramel, milk chocolate, butterfinger, white chocolate) makes for a nice visual effect, but you could use any number of layers with any kind of candy of nuts.





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