Salted Caramel Sauce

March 23, 2012Katie

I love chocolate dipped pretzels or anything else that combines sweet and salty.

In my grown-up tastes, things have been leaning towards “salty” and I knew when I heard the phrase “salted caramel” I would adore it or anything it was associated with.


And honestly, it’s relatively simple and requires very few ingredients.  I whipped up my first batch with no trouble in just a few minutes and then proceeded to eat it by the spoonful.  Then I smacked myself and put it away to use on something special at a later date.

I am thinking about chocolate cupcakes filled with the salted caramel sauce in the middle with icing over the top of it.  A sweet little salty surprise when you bite into the cupcake.

I’m also considering pouring it over popcorn  for a salted caramel corn movie snack one night..and adding pretzels and nuts for even more salty goodness.   Or because it’s fall, I”m naturally thinking about Salted Caramel Apples…which do you think sounds best?

You start with white sugar – two cups to be exact.  Use the heaviest bottomed pan you have so it will heat as evenly as possible.  Also, you want to be very careful during this process as caramel can be very hot and sometimes spit around a bit so wear long sleeves and/or oven mitts to do the stirring, or do like I did and use a dutch oven or other deep heavy pot.

This is not one of those recipes where you can scramble around and get out your ingredients as you cook. So have 4 tablespoons of butter sliced up and ready by your pot and also one-half cup of heavy cream.  Leave the sugar alone (don’t stir) and when it just begins to bubble around the edges and turn coppery brown, start to stir.  You’ll turn up the stuff on the bottom that is already browning.

Keep stirring until the sugar totally liquefies and is the color of a dark copper penny.  I actually preferred using a whisk at this point and you may see large crystal clumps begin to form. Keep stirring and it will melt eventually.

You don’t want it to be too light or light amber in color as the rich flavor comes from allowing the caramel to almost burn.

At this point, toss in your butter, six tablespoons to be exact.

Things may start to bubble a little so be very careful.  Then while whisking, add in your half cup of cream.

Add in 1/2 teaspoon of your salt of choice.  I added in fleur de sel but you could use pink Himalayan sea salt or whatever floats your boat!

Stir this in well until the mixture gets nice and creamy and then let it cool for a minute and pour it into a nice pretty jar.

And that’s it….you will now have a jar of luscious salted caramel awaiting your next fantasy.  You could spoon it over brownies, or dark chocolate ice cream…or…

Just eat it by the spoonful savoring each little taste a bite at at time.

 

Salted Caramel Sauce
 
Prep time
Total time
 
Author:
Ingredients
  • 2 c. white sugar
  • 6 T. unsalted butter
  • ½ c. whipping cream
  • ½ t. fleur de sel or Kosher salt
Instructions
  1. Use deep bottomed pot and use caution - wear long sleeves and/or oven mitts to stir. Over medium-high to high heat, let sugar sit in pan until edges begin to brown and bubble then stir quickly until mixture turns dark coppe penny colored. Quickly add in butter and stir, then Remove from heat and add cream and stir some more. Let cool and pour into jar after a few minutes.

 

 

Katie’s Printable Recipe – Salted Caramel Sauce

Pin It

Don't be afraid to comment! I LOVE to hear from my readers!

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Previous Post Next Post