It’s not just milk, dark and white chocolate. Fans of blond bars such as Caramac (sadly now discontinued) know there’s a fourth type out there that, when used to its potential, trumps the rest. This Easter, get to grips with the golden marvel that is caramelised white chocolate – it sounds cheffy but it’s easy to make – before incorporating it into one of our fabulous treats
FEATURE AND RECIPES EMILY GUSSIN
GOING FOR gold
As it comes, white chocolate can be a bit bland in flavour, simply serving creamy (some say cloying) sweetness with a hint of vanilla. Caramelising it, however, transforms it into something far greater. The sugars turn to caramel, the colour turns to gold and the flavour turns toasty, nutty and, well, caramel-like.
If you’ve eaten any of the ‘gold’ chocolate bars out there, you’ll know how good it is, but you’ll also know how sweet it is, whereas white chocolate that’s been caramelised at home is slightly different – dare we say better? Manufactured gold chocolate bars tend to be a mixture of white chocolate and sugary caramel, rather than caramelising the sugars already present in the chocolate, hence caramelised white chocolate is slightly less sweet than its ready-made counterparts.
Turning white chocolate into gold is simple – chop it, throw it in a low oven, give it a regular stir and wait for it to caramelise and turn golden. The stirring is key; skip this and the sugars will cook unevenly, resulting in burnt bitter bits. Use a silicone spatula as it allows you to move and stir every bit of chocolate.
Don’t panic if the chocolate turns chalky and lumpy halfway through – that’s just the chocolate separating out as it goes beyond the point of ‘melted’. As you continue to heat and stir, it will come together again into a uniformly smooth texture with a golden hue.
Once the chocolate is caramelised, you can either use it right away or cool it and let it solidify to use later. It’ll last as long as regular white chocolate (which is a long time), so it’s worth making a big batch then, once cooled, chopping it into chunks to use in baking.
You can make this recipe with any amount of white chocolate – provided it’s not tiny or huge (say between 50g and 500g). If you want to know the best way to use your precious time over the Easter weekend, this is it… Trust us!
BASE RECIPE Caramelised white chocolate
