Aotearoa & Maori · Dessert
Hokey Pokey
- Intermediate
- 15 min
- roughly 2 of 4 for cost
- Vegetarian
Leads with richness that coats and comforts, a sweet edge rounding the corners.
Ingredients
- 200 g caster sugar
- 80 g golden syrup
- 10 g baking soda, sifted
- butter, for the tin
The skills inside
Allergen screen
Found: dairy
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 20 cm tin and line it with paper before you start; once the soda goes in there is no time for anything else.
- Warm the sugar and golden syrup together in a deep heavy pan, stirring only until the sugar has dissolved, then stop stirring altogether.
- Boil to 150C (300F), or until a drop in cold water sets hard and snaps between the fingers; the colour will be deep amber.
- Take the pan off the heat, tip in the sifted baking soda and beat hard for three seconds only, while it quadruples and climbs the pan.
- Pour it into the tin without spreading it, leave it until cold and hard, then break it 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.
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