25 Days of Baking: Day 21

Day 21, I almost can't believe it! Can it really be this close to Christmas already?!? Shockingly we have no snow here, so it's making it hard to believe that Christmas is right around the corner. On the plus side, we haven't had to break out the snow blower yet!

Today I decided to make Turtles. I do love these, but once again, I have never made them before. I searched online for a good recipe, but I couldn't find one that I liked. Scratch that I did find one I thought I would like (the photos look like exactly what I wanted), but the recipe really wasn't complete. So in the end I combined a few and just made my own.

Homemade Turtles

• 2 1/2 cups pecan halves
• 25 caramel squares, unwrapped
• 1/8 cup cream
• 8oz. milk chocolate (I bought the Ghirardelli Chocolate bars)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Arrange pecans in a single layer, toast in oven until fragrant, about 10 min. Remove from oven. On a separate rimmed baking sheet arrange about 3 pecans together, making sure to overlap them some to keep the caramel from going right through the middle. Make about 18 clusters. 
2. Take 1/4 cup of pecans and finely chop them. Set aside to use for sprinkling on top of finished clusters.
3. In a microwave safe bowl, add the caramels and cream and heat for 3 minutes. Make sure to stir every 30 seconds.
4. Spoon enough caramel sauce over the pecan clusters to cover most of them in each cluster.
5. In a microwave safe bowl, break up chocolate and heat to melt it. I heated it for 15 seconds at a time until melted.
6. Spoon chocolate onto each cluster. More is always better! But make sure you have enough for each.
7. Sprinkle each turtle with chopped pecan halves before the chocolate sets.
8. Place tray in fridge to harden.

These were very easy to make and so delicious. I know these will be made again! They would also be a very easy gift to whip up when you need something! Whoever you give them to will be so impressed by all the work that went into them and how amazing they look, when really it took no time at all.

25 Days of Baking: Day 13

Today I am making Carmel Corn with Old Dutch Puffcorn. About 7 years ago I lived on this stuff during the Christmas season while I was working overnights to set Christmas decorations at Target! Ah memories. I don't miss working the graveyard shift and I really don't miss drinking Monster Energy drinks to stay awake! But this is a tradition that I want to keep.

This recipe comes straight from the back of the Old Dutch Puffcorn package.

Carmel Corn -Old Dutch Style

~1 package Old Dutch Puffcorn

~1 cup butter

~1 1/4 cups brown sugar

~2/3 cup light corn syrup

~1 tsp. baking soda

Directions

Preheat oven to 250 degrees.

Combine butter, brown sugar and light corn syrup in a 2 quart sauce pan, cook on medium heat until mixture has melted. Once mixture has melted add the baking soda. (Note: This will cause the mixture to foam.)

Pour Old Dutch Puffcorn into a large roaster pan. Pour caramel mixture over the puffcorn and stir until mixed.

Place in oven at 250 degrees for 45 minutes, stirring every 10-15 minutes. Please pay close attention at this time as oven temperature variance may affect final product.

Remove from oven, pour on wax paper and break apart. Let cool and enjoy.

Make sure not to over bake this as it does get hard to eat. It's best when its extra gooey in my opinion. I only baked mine for 38 min. and it is perfect! Very easy to make and a great addition on a holiday movie night that the whole family can enjoy! Or a great treat to snack on while wrapping Christmas gifts!