Bubble Nuts

Roasted Hazelnut Brittle

Yeah I know it's a bit late; in fact, in a couple of weeks Christmas will be a distant month old - Yikes!! I like to prolong the Christmas/New Year season as long as possible. It's a great time of the year and hey some people stretch out Chinese New Year celebrations over 2 weeks. Call it laziness, call it denial, but one year I left the Christmas decorations up till March :P

Due to screaming demands from a few recipients, and the W was so proud of her Christmas creations this year, here's the recipe for what our MiniB calls....Bubble Nuts.

Ah gotta love the creative mind of a 1 year old, who by the way loves bubbles, saw the sugar simmering and said "Ooh Bubbles". We warned her that the bubbles were very hot and not to touch them as the hazelnuts were being added and she replied "Bubble Nuts very hot!!", and thus the name was born.

Some may question the authenticity of this actually being a brittle recipe. I was quite surprised myself at how simple it was, not needing any confectionery/baking skills or many ingredients.

The first trial we let the sugar mixture heat a bit more than desired giving a slight burnt taste to the brittle. Overall, the amounts of the ingredients matched well together. The butter gave it a creamy taste, and roasting the hazelnuts gives it something extra. Very moreish!!














A little novelty to the gift was to find some mini-hammers to smash the brittle with. The W was looking high and low for them with no joy. She stumbled on some mini cleavers instead, which I thought looked better and gave the gifts a touch of "Dexter" bwahahah!! The girl at the Asia Mart questioned "What are you doing with all these?" and when told they were to used as gifts the look on her face was priceless - if only we bought some electrical tape and a body bag at the same time lol.


Hazelnut Brittle (aka MiniB's Bubble Nuts)

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups of sugar
1/2 cup of water
300 grams roasted hazelnuts
50 grams of butter

Method

• Place sugar and water into a saucepan and heat on med-low stirring constantly for 10mins or until the sugar is dissolved. Do not let the mixture come to the boil at this stage.

• Turn heat up to med-high and allow mixture to bubble without stirring until it begins to turn golden.

• Remove from heat and working quickly add the butter and hazelnuts stirring constantly until the butter is melted well mixed in,

• Pour into a baking tin and allow mixture to cool. It was a lot easier using a silicone lined baking tin as we found that baking paper would stick to the brittle and make a big mess :)

Till next time...we eat!!

Shanks