The Best Caramel Candy Recipe to Satisfy Your Sweet Tooth

Do you love fall baking? Here is a classic caramel candy recipe I've made for decades. I'll show you how it can also be used to make caramel corn, caramel apples or a caramel sauce for ice cream and other desserts. This one is the bomb!

There's just something about caramel that is traditional for autumn fall months and even into the winter season in the dessert realm.

This is my favorite caramel recipe that I've made for forty to fifty years, without fail. The key, however, is to use a candy thermometer. It is the make or break it element for the success of your caramel.

Easy Homemade Caramel Recipe

Ingredients

• 2 cubes of butter
• 2 1/4 c. brown sugar
• dash of salt
• 1 c. light corn syrup
• 1 14 oz can of condensed sweetened milk
• 1 t. vanilla
• Optional - coarse salt

Directions:

In a heavy saucepan on medium heat, melt the butter, then add brown sugar and salt.

Stir thoroughly. Gradually add in corn syrup and condensed milk stirring constantly. 

Increase the heat to a medium-high temperature, but watch it carefully. Stir constantly, if it feels like it may be too hot, go ahead and return it to medium. You don't want to burn it!

Using a candy thermometer, cook until it hits 245° F. 

Remove from heat and add the vanilla.

Pour into a buttered pan and allow to cool. When it is nearly cool, an optional step is to put a few coarse salt crystals on top, sparingly, for a salted caramel treat. 

Allow to cool completely, cut into squares and serve.

Caramel Sauce Recipe

Making a caramel sauce is great to use on ice cream, bread pudding, apple pie, waffles, and anything else you can think of.

Use the recipe above, EXCEPT - after removing from heat also add 1/2 c. heavy cream and increase the salt to 1/2 t. 

Heat to 220° F. and remove from heat.

When cooled, it can be put into jars where it can be kept for up to a month.

Caramel Apple Recipe

You will use the same recipe as above, but heat to 248°F.

To prepare the apples, boil a pan of water and dip your apples into boiling water for 30 seconds, remove and dry with a paper towel, this removes any wax the apple may have. Or use organic apples and wash.

Put sticks into the apples, and dip into your caramel. If you want you can also roll it into crushed walnuts.

Place on waxed paper or parchment to cool.

Caramel Popcorn Recipe

Pop up a large bowl of popcorn and allow it to cool.

If you want to make it crunchy, preheat an oven to 225°F. If not crunchy, skip this step.

Heat the caramel to 250°F.

Use the recipe above, except when you remove it from heat, stir in 1/2 t. baking soda, and use 1 t. of salt in the recipe. It will foam, so keep stirring until that stops. 

Pour the caramel slowly over the popcorn and stir frequently, stirring the bottom of the popcorn up to the top. Keep doing this until it is fully coated. If it gets too soggy, add more popcorn.

Place on waxed paper, spread out to cool.

You can also, butter your hands and form into balls to make popcorn balls if you want.

For the crunchy caramel corn option, put it on a parchment paper lined pan and bake for 20 minutes. Remove, put back in the bowl, stir it up and return it to the oven again for 20 minutes.

Remove from heat and allow it to cool, breaking up any large chunks.

Enjoy.

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Book Recommendation: For all of you who love caramel, here's a book filled with all caramel recipes.

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