Homemade Candy Corn

I've talked for years about trying to make my own candy corn. I looked unsuccessfully for recipes a few years ago. This year, I looked again and actually found several blogs and food sites that had tried it. All of them used the same recipe more or less. And I've even adapted it for my context. All the recipes called for corn syrup. I have a recipe on here for making your own corn syrup, but I really wasn't feeling like doing that this weekend. So, remembering in the back of my mind that many packs of Brach's candy corn say "made with real honey," I decided to give it a try using just that. It was actually pretty good! Pretty honey-y, though. I did have a little Karo corn syrup on hand and seeing how the recipe calls for so little, I tried it using half corn syrup and half honey. I had several taste testers, and all agreed that the half/half was much closer to the original. This was a really fun candy recipe to make, so I hope you'll give it a try! But you might not want to eat it side by side with the real stuff--you'll probably find too many flaws that way! Ha! My only big trouble was humidity. My candy didn't get real hard or anything--but that's just where I live and I'll have to deal with that! I think you could do this without a candy thermometer but you'll probably have better luck if you have one.  Altitude, pan choice, humidity, gas/electric heat, etc. will all affect boiling time. Ideally, you should also calibrate your thermometer (I didn't). There is a great post about how to do that here. This was a lot of fun with the kids!

Homemade Candy Corn

1/2 cup white sugar

1/3 cup corn syrup, honey or combination of the two (I did half of each and we liked it!)

2 1/2 Tbs butter (I probably used between 2 and 2 1/2 in my best batch)

1 1/2 tsp vanilla

1 1/8 cups powdered sugar

2 1/2 Tbs powdered milk

dash of salt (use 1/8 tsp if butter is unsalted)

Red and yellow food coloring

Heat white sugar, syrup/honey, and butter in a small saucepan over low heat, stirring to dissolve. 

Once butter is melted and bubbles are forming around the edges, turn heat up to medium high and cook until syrup reaches nearly 240F/115C (soft ball stage)--about 2 minutes for me. I cut it off just a little before then. Remove from hot burner and stir in vanilla (watch out for bubbles and spattering when you add it!).  Allow syrup to sit and cool about 10-15 minutes--stirring occasionally. Meanwhile, sift together powdered sugar, powdered milk and salt into a bowl. 

Once syrup is getting a little sticky and cool enough to touch, pour into the dry mix. It will still be really warm. 

Stir it around just a little with a spatula or spoon, then you'll need to use your hands to knead together the syrup and dry sugar mix. 

Mix in as much of the powdered sugar mix as you can into the dough. 

Place dough on a clean surface and separate into 3 equal pieces. 

Make an indentation in each piece. In 2 of them, place about 8-9 drops of yellow food color in each. Add an additional 4-5 drops of red to one of them. In the 3rd piece, I added a few drops of plain water because I felt working that little bit of liquid into them smoothed the dough and made it more workable. I used a little baby medicine dropper for this or just flick in a few drops by hand (make sure its drinkable since you won't cook this again). 

Knead color into dough until uniform. 

Break off about 1/4 of each color of dough. Remember back to preschool play dough playing days and roll the dough into snakes. A 1/4 pinch will make about a 1 1/2 to 2 foot long snake. Don't worry if it breaks apart easily, just pinch back together and place 3 colors side by side and lightly squeeze together. 

Diagonally cut back and forth with a knife or pizza cutter to make little triangles. 

Transfer to a piece of parchment, wax paper, or a Silpat. Allow candy to sit out for several hours to harden a bit (unless you live in a humid place--it won't really harden! It might get more sticky!). Repeat the process 3 more times with the remaining dough. If dough has dried out or hardened too much, work in a few drops of water. Store in an airtight container with wax paper or Saran wrap between layers to keep it from sticking back into one big mess.