Georgia · Dessert
Georgia Peanut Brittle
- Intermediate
- 40 min
- roughly 2 of 4 for cost
- Vegetarian
Leads with toasted, nutty warmth throughout, richness that coats and comforts, leaving a faint perfume.
Ingredients
- 400g sugar
- 250ml corn syrup
- 120ml water
- 55g butter
- 300g raw Georgia peanuts
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp vanilla
Equipment
Sheet pan
The skills inside
Allergen screen
Found: dairy · nuts · peanuts
Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.
Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.
Method
- Butter a large sheet pan and warm it slightly.
- Boil the sugar, corn syrup, and water to 120C, then add the butter and peanuts.
- Keep cooking, stirring constantly, to 150C: the syrup will turn amber and the peanuts will smell toasted.
- Off the heat quickly stir in the salt, baking soda, and vanilla; it will foam up pale.
- Pour onto the pan, spread thin with a buttered spatula, and cool completely before breaking into shards.
How to tell it is going right
This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the technique it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.
Sugar stages & caramel 53 recipes
- Nothing is stirred once it is boiling, and any crystals clinging to the side of the pan are brushed down rather than left to fall in.
- Judged by temperature or by a tested stage rather than by time: consecutive stages are a few degrees apart and look identical in the pan.
- Colour is read off the heat and in good light, remembering that sugar keeps darkening after the flame is out.
- Stopped decisively at the point wanted: off the heat and into the next liquid or onto a cold surface, rather than left to coast in a hot pan.
- The result is clear and smooth rather than grainy, cloudy, or seized into a solid mass.
Where it goes wrong It was stirred after coming to the boil, or a stray crystal from the side of the pan fell back in. One crystal seeds the whole pan and the syrup turns grainy within seconds, and once sugar has crystallised the only cure is more water and starting the whole thing again.
At the Table
- The Pour
- Sauternes
- Also Right
- Demi-sec Champagne
- From the Taps
- Belgian tripel
- Zero-Proof
- Jasmine tea
The sweetness rule is absolute: the pour must be sweeter than the plate, and acid keeps it from cloying.
Saved on this device and kept across visits: export from My Menu to move them.