Quick and simple candied nuts
If you were to look in my freezer one thing that you would always find is a bag with candied buts, often hazelnuts. I use them as an extra item to add to salads, savoury grain dishes, along with cheese, desserts, over breakfast oatmeal, in pancakes or waffles, I’ll stop here but you get the picture.
Sometimes I buy instead of making them and we have a few good sources for buying them prepared, but really there is no excuse to not making them yourself. I generally make a caramel first and then mix the nuts into it, allowing them to dry coated with caramel but I know that not everyone is comfortable making caramel. The other day I was browsing through some recipes online and stumbled upon a Bon Appetit recipe they call 5 minutes candied nuts. Just reading through the recipe I knew it was a solution for anyone who wants to make a no-fail version of candied nuts. So here we are, I made them and passing the method on to you.
You can use any nuts you’d like, hazelnuts, almonds, walnuts, pecans, pistachios, etc. I think they used pistachios in the Bon Appetite recipe. Once cooled, store them in a plastic bag in the freezer and pull out as much as you need for using in your recipes.
If you do feel adventurous you can use this recipe as a base for making spiced nuts: as the nuts are cooking as a little chili powder, sea salt, cinnamon, curry powder etc.
Recipe adapted from Bon Appetite.
Ingredients:
2 cups nuts
3 tablespoons sugar
Directions:
Place 2 tablespoons of the sugar and the nuts in a wide skillet and heat over medium heat until the sugar begins to melt. Be sure to stir the nuts and the sugar constantly.
As the sugar begins to melt and the nuts begin to toast you may need to remove the skillet from the ehat for a moment or two, stirring, to cool it down a bit so the sugar doesn’t burn.
Continue to stir until most of the sugar melts.
Add the last tablespoon of sugar and continue to stir until the sugar begins to melt and stick to the nuts.
Remove from heat and spread the nuts over a sheet of parchment paper.
Let cool, then refrigerate in a freezer bag in the freezer.
Use as needed.
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