Spicy Peanut Brittle Recipe (Using Leftover Cowboy Candy Syrup) - Our Little Homestead (2024)

FAQs

Why put baking soda in peanut brittle? ›

Baking soda is a key ingredient in peanut brittle. It's what aerates the candy, giving it a nice light crunch. Why didn't my homemade peanut brittle get hard? The main reason why peanut brittle doesn't get hard and have the crunch we expect is because the sugar was not cooked long enough.

Cowboy candy is another name for candied jalapeños. Because jalapeños are a spicy pepper bursting with flavor, they're perfect to be pickled and sweetened up. By boiling them with sugar and vinegar, you create a beautiful balance between sweet, spicy, and acidic.

Ways to use cowboy candy

Literally anything. Top a burger, a bagel and cream cheese or a pizza. Chop and add to any salad, especially ones where you might otherwise use pickle relish — egg, chicken or potato salad, for example — or dips and sandwich spreads. They elevate nachos to a religious experience.

This is because you did not cook it long enough in the microwave. If the texture of the peanut brittle is sticky, and not crunchy, this means that you need to cook the mixture longer, until it reaches 300°F.

The candy will attract moisture from the air, making it unpleasantly sticky instead of shatteringly crisp. Once it's completely cool, transfer it to an airtight container.

What's important to know is that the corn syrup controls the grain of the brittle so adding too little and you have a grainy textured brittle, while adding too much will result in a stringy and sticky brittle.

Cowboy candy tastes sweet with a little heat—almost like bread and butter pickles with a zing and a kick.

According to the brand, the current owners' grandmother, Mindie Heironimus, invented the treat as a way to use surplus jalapeños. In 1922, she pickled the jalapeños the same way she did with cucumbers, and the family took to calling the sweet and spicy result Cowboy Candy®.

No one is quite sure how the catchy name came to be, but it's stuck around, just like everyone's love of 'em. Can I use frozen jalapeños for cowboy candy? Save your frozen jalapeños for another recipe—fresh is best here! If you use frozen peppers, they'll turn out far too mushy.

What is Cowboy Candy slang? ›

WHAT IS COWBOY CANDY? Cowboy Candy is a fun name for candied jalapeños.

Now there's another flavorful cowboy dish to add to your vocabulary: cowboy candy, a jarred condiment that brings the heat and the sweet. Essentially candied jalapeños, cowboy candy offers the tantalizing blend of sugar and spice that naturally compliments savory dishes, falling into the same class as pepper jelly.

Why did my peanut brittle turn out chewy? The likely cause is that the sugar mixture didn't reach the proper hard crack stage temperature. Ensuring it reaches 300˚F is key to getting that classic brittle texture.

Peanut brittle turning white, often referred to as "sugaring," is typically the result of crystallization of the sugar in the candy. This crystallization can make the brittle appear white or cloudy rather than having a clear, glass-like consistency.

Working quickly, pour into prepared 10×15 pan. To keep the brittle light and airy, do not spread or flatten the mixture. Instead, let it flow freely. Place in a cool area and leave until completely cooled, about 2-3 hours.

Baking soda helps to aerate brittle — it literally makes the molten candy bubble in the pot — to create a brittle with an airy, almost honeycomblike texture that crunches easily when eaten.

The soda reacts with the acid to make bubbles, and the syrup foams. When the cooked syrup is poured out and begins to harden, many of the tiny bubbles are trapped before they can escape (another reason the baking soda is added at the end).