Oh, Fiddle Faddle!

I'm a complete junkie for snack foods that combine a little sweet with a little salty. That's why stuff like Cracker Jack and Fiddle Faddle and the old Morley Candymakers' classic, Almond Pecan-dy Crunch, easily satisfy my occasional craving for something crunchy, sweet, and salty. Years ago, my brother and I experimented with a recipe for caramel corn that felt nothing short of a mad scientist's lab experiment. It seemed to have a thousand ingredients, and took all afternoon to make. Or, so it felt in my pre-teen mind. So, for years, I shied away from making it again, expecting it to be just one big headache.

Then, while thrifting one afternoon, I found an old popcorn air popper similar to the one my family had when I was a kid. It's a tower-shaped popper, the kind that you drop the kernels into, and spits the popped corn out of its spout into a waiting bowl. It even has the little attachment that's supposed to melt butter and drip onto the popcorn but never really works all that well. It inspired me to try my hand again at making my own caramel corn at home.

What I forgot was that this type of popper tends to be inefficient, spitting out dozens of unpopped kernels into the bowl along with the popped corn. I find myself repeatedly scooping up the unpopped kernels and putting them back into the popper until all have been popped. Looking back, I would have been better off buying a round, dome-shaped, popper that keeps everything contained until kernels have popped. When flipped over, the dome can even double as a serving bowl. Ingenious.

In any event, I found a recipe on http://www.epicurious.com/ that seemed like a piece of cake. Indeed, it was. Although this recipe calls for the popcorn to be cooked in a bit of oil on the stove in a large, covered saucepan, I adapted it to use air-popped popcorn, and substituted its suggested addition of peanuts for almonds. It saves a little on fat (but only a little!), and results in a delicious, crunchy, sweet-and-salty confection that rivals any of the packaged brands. And, it makes a TON of the delicious treat, for a fraction of the price.

Caramel Corn Clusters with Almonds

Ingredients:

1/3 c. popcorn kernels

1 stick butter

1-1/2 c. light brown sugar

1/2 c. light corn syrup

3/4 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1 c. salted almonds

Special tool: air popcorn popper

Cook popcorn in air popper according to manufacturer directions. Set aside.

Line bottom of a large baking pan with parchment paper or foil. Melt butter in a 6-quart heavy pot over moderate heat. Add brown sugar and corn syrup and bring to a boil over moderate heat, stirring, then boil without stirring, approximately 8-10 minutes. Remove pot from heat.

Using a wooden spoon or heatproof spatula, stir salt and baking soda into caramel, then quickly stir in popcorn and almonds and stir to combine. Immediately spread mixture onto pan evenly. Cool completely, and break into clusters.

Makes about 12 cups.

Recipe adapted from Gourmet, September 2004, via http://www.epicurious.com/