Salted Honey & Vanilla Bean Caramels

There are oh-so-many options to explore when it comes to sending gifts to family and friends over the holiday season – especially in the midst of a 2020 holiday season! Enter Salted Honey & Vanilla Bean Caramels – just in time to wrap and send over to your loved ones before Christmas!

But isn’t Caramel hard to make?

Caramel has a reputation for being quite difficult to make – although the ingredients are complicated in and of themselves, the process can feel intimidating!

This recipe is truly quite simple, making it one of my very favorites.- You’re essentially dumping all ingredients (other than the butter) into a pot and monitoring the temperature.

Tips for Making Caramel

1. Pay attention to the specific temperatures of your caramel throughout the entire process. Make sure to use a thermometer and babysit the caramel to ensure that you are hitting the right temperatures.
2. Use an extra-large pot! Throughout the process of cooking caramel, it will foam up and increase in volume significantly. To avoid the caramel from spilling over, opt for an extra-large heavy bottom pan and you’ll be golden.
3. Make sure to grease your pan! This ensures that your finished caramel will not get stuck – a tragedy!
4. Patience! Caramel takes a while to firm up as it needs to naturally cool down to room temperature. I suggest waiting eight hours at least before removing them from its pan and cutting them into your preferred shapes.

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Making Salted Honey & Vanilla Bean Caramels

Let’s get into the process of making these caramels!

• Add your cream, sugar, honey, corn syrup, salt and vanilla in a large heavy bottomed pot

• Monitoring with a candy thermometer, cook contents until you’ve reached exactly 248 degrees Fahrenheit

• Add butter to slightly cool caramel and prevent it from cooking any longer. Stir gently to disperse

• Once butter has fully incorporated, pour into 8×8 baking pan lined with parchment and coated in baking spray so that the caramel does not stick

• Top with flaky sea salt 10 minutes after caramel has been poured into the pan. This allows the caramel to set slightly on the top so that the salt does not sink into the caramel

• Let sit for at least 8 hours, preferably overnight so that the caramel sets completely

Wrapping Caramels

What’s fun about your complete caramels is that you can cut them in any size or shape that you would like! The caramels above were cut at a 2.5-inch length and a 1/2 inch width. I’ve also cut my caramels into 1×1 inch square and wrapped them in parchment or wax paper as an alternative shape!

When cutting your caramels prior to wrapping, note that because the caramel is so malleable, your fingerprints will appear if you don’t use gloves. As I love to give these caramels as gifts, I prefer to use gloves so that my fingerprints are not noticeable even if I am using clean hands!

Coating Caramels in Chocolate

Instead of wrapping your caramels, you could opt to cover them in milk or dark chocolate and sprinkle them with sea salt! In the case pictured above, I coved square cuts of caramel with dark chocolate, then added crushed pretzels on top for added salt and texture!