Sponge Toffee

There is one huge problem with being dairy free.....the lack of chocolate bars. Back when dairy didn't rip my gut up, I ate chocolate bars all the time. Crunchie bars were one of my favourites. I loved the sponge toffee centre wrapped with milk chocolate. I thought my Crunchie days were over until I found a recipe for sponge toffee.

The recipe was pretty simple. Boil a whole bunch of sugar until it reaches the hard crack (haha) stage and then add baking soda. The boiling part was pretty easy, but my candy thermometer was on the fritz and gave the wrong reading. I ended up using a meat thermometer, and that didn't work very well either. I knew my sugar had reached the right temperature, but I kept waiting to see 300 degrees anyway. Next time I'll trust my gut and not over cook my sugar. It still tastes great, just a little more dark.

When they say to use a deep saucepan in the recipe, they aren't joking! When you add the sugar mixture to the pot, it looks like nothing. Once you add the baking soda it really bubbles up! I used a stock pot, and I'm glad I did. I wouldn't have wanted to clean spilled toffee for days. The recipe also doesn't tell you when to add the vanilla, so I forgot to add it. Next time I'll add it to the sugar mixture before it starts to boil. Once the toffee set, I broke it into chunks using a serated knife.

To bring the toffee to the Crunchie level, I melted semi sweet chocolate chips and added a little canola oil to thin it out. I dipped the chunks of toffee in the chocolate mixture and waited for it to harden.

I must say, the toffee is pretty good! It really tastes like a Crunchie bar to me! If you don't have a problem with milk chocolate, I bet it would taste even more like the real thing. The recipe also made a tonne of candy, so it's perfect for sharing at Easter time! Next chocolate bar to tackle....Wonderbar!