I made a ton of food for Thanksgiving (four types of gravy!) and most of it turned out just fine. Except for the Cranberry Pecan Tart.
Usually I am a pie man, but I figured I'd try to broaden my horizons this year beyond the standard Karo syrup pecan pie recipe (classic though it may be). I found a recipe for a Cranberry Pecan Tart in an old issue of Cooks Illustrated, so I decided to give it a shot. The recipe requires you to caramelize some sugar. I remember making caramel corn all by myself back in middle school, so I figured how hard could it be?
Hard. Solid, crysalized-sugar stalagmites hard, to be specific. Caramel fail.
In fact, it took me three tries to make this recipe. On the first shot, I wasn't really paying attention and the next thing I know my pan of slow bubbling caramel sugar had turned into concrete-hard crystalized sugar rock candy. That was on Thanksgiving day and seeing as how I was running late and already had enough food to feed a small army, I vowed to try another day.
On the second shot, I did a little better, but I still had crystalized sugar problems:
On the third shot, I was extra careful and got the desired result:
It remains to be seen if the finished product actually tastes good, as it's still in the oven. However, I can offer the following advice:
- It's a good idea to stir your water and sugar together pretty well before you start, but also be sure wipe any stray sugar crystals down from the sides of the pot.
- Apply lots of heat to your best pan to make sure the sugar cooks hot and evenly.
- Do not stir at all until your sugar reaches 300ยบ / light golden color. Even then, only gently swishing of the pot is advised, no actual stiring.
- When you are boiling the sugar, if you can see lots of sugar crystals forming on the top of the bubbles of the boiling water, you have already failed.
