Moments of Orange: October 2011

Last week the boys and I stopped by the grocery store to pick up something for dinner. As we were passing the produce section, I saw packages of caramel candies, of course, by the apples. Knowing I had just bought a huge bag of apples earlier that week, I thought it would be fun to buy some caramels and make caramel apples....I don't know what came over me (maybe two boys begging and pleading with me).

So today was caramel apple making day. The boys were playing outside, so I tried to finish them before either of them came barreling through the house, because I wanted to surprise them. Yes, they knew I would be making them at some point, but they didn't know when. To tell you the truth, I think they had forgotten about them. Were they surprised? Jonathan was, but Benjamin caught me making them (he kept it a secret).

The recipe for the caramel apples is on the package of caramels, but I'll go ahead and walk through what I did in case you buy caramels out of a bin instead of a package.

Ingredients:

5 medium apples, washed, well dried
14 oz. pkg. Kraft caramels (about 50 pieces)
2 tablespoons water
5 wooden popsicle sticks or lollipop sticks

Remove the stems from the apples (the stacked apples are just me being cute). These are McIntosh apples, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't really matter what kind of apples are used.

Insert the wooden popsicle sticks or lollipop sticks into the STEM of each apple. I used lollipop sticks, because that's what I happened to have on hand. I chose the longer ones, so I could work with the apples better when I had them in the caramel.

Cover a large plate with wax paper paper; grease with butter. Set aside. If greasing the wax paper with butter, use A LOT!! My suggestion is to use non stick cooking spray.

Place caramels and water in large saucepan; cook on medium-low heat until caramels are completely melted, stirring occasionally. I have a flat top electronic/digital stove (whatever it's called), and put the burner on 5 and it was perfect.

Caramels in the saucepan with 2 tablespoons water.

They're melting like the witch on The Wizard of Oz. I know it looks gross, but now you know how it's supposed to look if you make these.

Almost there.....

And we're there!! Let's start dipping!

Of course I don't have a picture of the apple actually in the caramel, but here is the first caramel apple I've ever made!! I've never even had one....I haven't even had one of these yet! The kids wolfed them down.