After my peanut butter disasters I decided the only way I was going to change my foodie mojo was redemption. What started this all off in the first place was my weird caramel spider on my mini mud pies. I decided to take Ava up on her recipe suggestion and make Michael Smith’s Butterscotch Sauce.
Working with boiling sugar scares the hell out of me so I figured this would be a bit of a sacrifice on my part which I thought might help appease the foodie gods. Whenever you work with boiling sugar make sure to have a glass of ice water on hand in case some gets on your skin. Which, as usually, I totally forgot to do, adding yet another dimension of danger to this challenge.
You are supposed to pour the sugar into the middle of the water in a mound in a sauce pan which I found disappeared so quickly I could not really get a photo of it. You do this to avoid getting sugar along the sides of the pan where it is like to crystallize and not dissolve.
Heat over high heat without stirring. No sloshing please! First it will dissolve into a syrup and then over time (quite a bit of time) it will begin to brown. Sugar darkens super fast so move on the next step as soon as you see this happening. I personally could smell it caramelize before I saw it so I grabbed for my butter.
I very carefully added it to the sugar and then whisked it in. The butter should bring down the temperature but see how dark it is getting even with the butter? You got to move quickly.
Whisk in the whipping/heavy cream and then some vanilla. Take off the heat. I personally let it cool before moving it into a mason jar:
Ava is right, at first it seems to be quite a thin sauce but once it chills it thickens. The mason jar really is the perfect vessel for the sauce once it had cooled down a bit.
It fits perfectly! Extra points for that! I am also a sucker for stuff in pretty jars. It warms my heart.
i
Considering all the sugar and fat in the sauce, I drizzled it over some fat free frozen vanilla yogurt to feel a little less guilty. It was divine! I mean, it really was perfect. It had that true and classic butterscotch flavour I have loved since I was a kid and really took a pretty typical dessert and made it feel special and a little homemade.
Was this sauce enough to turn my bad luck in the kitchen around? Are the foodie gods appeased with me sacrificing potential personal well being in the form of fear, safety and high fat content in my diet? You will just have to wait and see! In the meantime, make this sauce.
I give it five out of five wooden spoons.
The butterscotch pools so seductively on the vanilla ice cream in your photo!
Well if this doesn’t appease the foodie gods I don’t know what will. So happy you enjoyed the sauce. It never lasts very long here when I make it. Between the dollops on ice cream and spoonfuls of sampling, it can disappear pretty darn quick. The photo looks just scrumptious.
Homemade butterscotch sauce is divine. I prefer it over chocolate sauce!
Thanks Debra! I was going for the seduction angle, LOL. I agree Ava and it appears that no sacrifice was required as far as I can tell. Shelagh, I do too, I much more of a caramel/butterscotch gal than a chocolate sauce one but Ava says his recipe for chocolate sauce is out of this world so I may have to try it!
Susie, congrats on a great job with the sauce. I’ve had my share of disasters when working with water and sugar. I don’t even want to count the number of times I’ve had to restart a creme caramel recipe. I either have turned the sauce portion into hard as rock white sugar or burnt it. It’s so important not to stir while it’s cooking, and to keep a close eye on it because it will turn on you like a wild dog.
Thanks Anna and me too, caramel can be downright wicked! You totally have to keep an eye on it. It’s tough because it takes so long to brown but once the process begins it darkens so darn fast!
Suzie, just an FYI in case you do want to try the chocolate sauce. Once it’s refrigerated it turns quite solid. I guess the chocolate trys to return to it’s original state in the cold. All you need to do is scoop out what you need from the jar, plop it in a small dish and microwave for a few seconds, and then you have a warm, gooey, fudgy sauce. Fantastic over warm brownies and ice cream.
Oh my look at that liquid golden glory! I could drink it straight from the jar…of course, I’d much prefer a big chocolatey brownie dolloped with vanilla ice cream to help transfer this luscious sauce to my mouth. Great recipe!
I’m a big fan of Michael Smith, this looks great!
Good to know about the consistency of the chocolate sauce, thanks Ava! Yes, it is tempting to just eat isn’t it! Thanks Brilynn!