Take 2, as in: this is the second go around the Crunchie merry-go-round. You can also take two of these squares, too, at your own risk!
The other day, I saw the most amazing picture of sponge candy, aka Honeycomb, Hokey Pokey, Crunchie, Sea Foam (as you can see, this candy is so popular, it self-mutates it’s own name) on Foodgawker. So, I surfed on over to the woman’s blog, to check her recipe out and was all, “Wow, this must be one hell of a recipe, because she is a freaking organic chemist!” I took enough chemistry in college to be simultaneously scared of it and respectful of the chemist.
Then, I got to remembering that I might have a photo on my phone of this recipe from the CIA Chocolates & Confections book I mentioned in my previous Crunchie post , because as I’ve divulged before, I take pictures of books in bookstores. I then forget about said photos, and they languish on my memory card, dust gathering on their pixels…until something happens to make me remember one of them. Well, since this was the recipe that got me interested in the book in the first place, it stands to reason that I took a picture of the recipe.
So, I dug through my phone, and uncovered these:
Come to find out, both recipes are virtually identical, even down to the instructions (what are the odds, eh?)…so I decided to take another crunch at it. I feel I am getting closer. I really thought the baking soda in the first recipe was too much, and it’s about the same in this recipe…so I did what I promised myself I would do: I decreased it by half, to 1 1/2 tsp. It definitely improved the flavor, and the fizz factor was not affected much at all, not noticeably, anyhow. I also like that the bubbles are much finer than they were the first time, so I’m thinking, “Decrease the baking soda a bit more!” Well, we’ll see.
I feel like the sugar is being taken to too high a temperature (or perhaps my digital thermometer is off a bit?), since the candy is too dark in color…the next time I do this, I will drop the temperature down a few notches, and see how it goes. Also, I’ll follow the CIA book’s suggestion and put the honey in when the syrup is higher in temperature.
Considering that an organic chemist came up with almost the exact same recipe and the exact same technique as the CIA, I am totally convinced to buy the book. Ironic, since my mom suggested popping into BN over the weekend to purchase it, and I was all, “Noooo, we have too many cookbooks!”
