sharing – Eat – Drink

This was another long-awaited cooking bucket list item. I’ve wanted to make lavender caramels since 2012. I have a huge bag of dried lavender that I bought off eBay (of all places) to make peach lavender jam last year. The jam has become an annual canning staple, but that is a post for warmer days.

I anticipated a few hours from start to finish, but my expectations were far exceeded. From gathering ingredients to what you see above took over four (active) hours–this is not including the hour I let the caramel cool in the fridge. While the escapade was an eventual success, it is one I will be unlikely to repeat.

I followed this recipe, as suggested in the original article. It does not specify the type of milk, but we are making candy so I assumed whole would be the choice. We only have 2% in the house, but I bulked up the fat content by replacing some of the called for “milk” with extra heavy cream.

I used twice the lavender because I have so much and I did not want to risk losing the flavor due to the age of the dried lavender. I ended up swapping some of the honey for sugar; not by choice, I did not have enough on hand. Were I to ever choose to make caramels again, I would use even less. The final product tastes more like honey caramels than lavender caramels. Not terrible, but defeating in the face of the effort.

As this was my first foray into candy making with my fancy new thermometer, I was fascinated by the process and transformation of the ingredients.

At the onset, the honey is the predominant colorant. I had more lavender milk than I was supposed to begin with, so I spoiled myself with a mini honey-lavender cafe au lait.

Watch what happens as we turn up the heat!

(not really, the caramel is cooked over a relatively low heat for an excruciatingly long time)

While this was the longest part of the process, it was the easiest.

The process above took the most effort. The caramel was completely adhered to the paper and each piece had to been individually pared or peeled. Wrapping was a misery due to the excessive fat content–these adorable cubes were greasy. Very greasy.

But they taste good! And I’ve wanted to make them for eight years. This also afforded me the opportunity to shower my friends with gifts. I danced around the kitchen warbling, “Share what you’ve got!” which has become my new summer anthem.

Four care packages were delivered with various salad greens, herbs (chives, chinese flowering leeks, mint, thyme, parsley, catnip), a bottle of strawberry booch, caramels, and two adopted SCOBYs.