Buttery Peanut Brittle

My dear Grandma Pauline Violet Streeter is being eulogized today. She passed on Monday the 29th. I'm unable to go to the funeral so I wanted to honor her with making one of her recipes today. And it's only fitting that it's a recipe I remember her making at Christmastime.

This is the only recipe I actually called to get from my Grandma. When I inherited her cookbooks this particular recipe was written and rewritten on multiple 3x5 cards and on small pieces of paper and written around the printed recipe in the actual cookbook.

And to be honest I'm glad I had every last one of them. When I called her for this recipe I wrote it down when I was talking to her and it is blatantly obvious as well. It isn't very coherent because she was giving me little tips about this and that as she told me the recipe. All GOOD information but makes the recipe itself a little difficult to understand and follow. The year I called for it I tried cooked fudge and ended up with a permanent fixture to my pan which made me a little leery about trying anything that required a thermometer and I never made the peanut brittle. I've since made hard candy with a thermometer and it turned out great so that gave me the courage to try this.

I also made the last meal I remember eating with her for dinner tonight. I can post that recipe if anyone is interested but I won't unless there is interest. I also remember eating blueberry pancakes with her but blueberries cost a fortune here in the desert so I wasn't planning that for dinner. Then one of my friends brought by some frozen blueberries tonight. Small blessings. I'll make blueberry pancakes later on this week.

SOOOO...Peanut Brittle

You start with a heavy pan ideally with straight sides. In it you mix 2 cups of sugar, 1 cup of light corn syrup ( or corn sugar if you prefer ) and a 1/2 cup of water and mix it all together over medium to high heat.

When the sugar dissolves and the mixture comes to a complete boil put the butter in ( 1 cup ).

Yeah this is not low calorie. It is called BUTTERY Peanut brittle you know...

Meanwhile I put two buttered cookie sheets in the freezer. My grandma also suggested using a marble slab because it stays so cool. Someday I'd like to try that, just don't have a marble slab.

Let it boil for awhile but when the temp gets up to 230 degrees F you'll need to watch it and stir it more often.

When the temperature gets to 280 degrees you add 2 cups peanuts.

If you are using raw peanuts you should add a teaspoon of salt to the mixture. My grandma suggested warming the peanuts up in the microwave before putting them in so that they wouldn't cool the candy. I didn't do this because my microwave has hot spots but I would recommend trying it because it dropped the temperature 20 degrees when I put them in.

I used spanish peanuts and that's what my grandma put in the recipe and I don't know if that's important but it doesn't surprise me in the least that she specified spanish peanuts and anyone in my family would know why.

My grandma always kept spanish peanuts in a beautiful blue candy dish in her cupboard. Everyone in the family always admired that blue dish. I was astonished one Christmas to open a package from my grandma and find the coveted blue candy dish.

It is one of my most treasured possessions. It was fun to have spanish peanuts in it once again.

So after you put the peanuts in the candy it's constant stirring time. When the temp gets up to 305 degrees remove the pan from heat and add a teaspoon of soda and "stir like crazy" and then pour onto your chilled cookie sheets.

Then with forks stretch thin by gently pulling the edges up and out and as it cools. As soon as you can you'll want to break it up and take it off the pan as you might get a permanent fixture to your cookie sheet if you don't.

I don't know if I'd butter the pans again. It was a valuable in getting the candy off the cookie sheets but it seemed to make it really greasy and not in a good way. It made my hands so slick. It didn't seem to have a long lasting affect though. I also wonder if this recipe might be better with real butter rather than margarine that I used.

"May the restless dead find sleep and may the light of our remembering lead them to an everlasting peace"

My cousin had this on her facebook status. I really liked it and thought it was appropriate for this post. May Grandma ever know how much we love her, miss her and think about her.