Recipe ~ Chocolate Dipped Nut Brittle

Anna Olson, the pastry chef, inspired this recipe for chocolate dipped nut brittle. You may have seen her on the Food Network in a few of her cooking shows including Fresh.

It’s a nut brittle that in the end is dipped in chocolate - doesn’t everything taste better when dipped in chocolate? - and then sprinkled with bits of sea salt. It’s a nice sweet and salty taste with all the goodness of chocolate. Yum!

You can use a mixture of nuts for this recipe as long as they equal two cups. I prefer cashews and pecans and had some almonds left over from Christmas baking that I added in. Put them on a tray – I can’t find mine so I put them in a oblong casserole dish – and stick them in the oven at 350F for about 8-10 minutes to toast them. You have to watch them because you don’t want to burn them. That would be an expensive mistake because there’s no saving burnt nuts.

Mix together in a small bowl, the butter, the baking soda and the vanilla. Don’t bother to mix it up, just set it aside for now. Confession – this calls for unsalted butter and I used regular salted butter. No biggie.

You need to use a pan that has a heavy bottom for this next part. Combine the sugar, corn syrup and a 1/3 cup of water to a boil, uncovered.

You cook it for 12 minutes over high heat until it turns a light amber colour but mine never did turn to an amber colour.

Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the butter, baking soda and vanilla. You are suppose to use a wooden spoon but I used a spatula and no catastrophe occurred. The baking soda foams up the mixture when you add it, which took me by surprise, as I hadn’t read that far in the recipe. Kind of freaks you out if you’re not ready for it.

Stir in your toasted nuts so they are well covered.

Now you can put the hot mixture into your tray. Line the tray with parchment paper that’s been greased with butter so it’s easier to work with later. The tray should be about 16” x 10” so your brittle is thin. I didn’t have a tray that large so my brittle turned out thicker. Next time I would splurge and get the larger tray. It will result in more pieces since they are thinner and a more brittle, brittle. Set the brittle aside and let it cool down to room temperature.

Now to get your chocolate ready, melt it in the microwave. Ok I forgot to take a picture of the warm chocolate but here’s the photo of the end result - empty chocolate bowl with just enough to lick later.

Now that the brittle is brittle, remove it from the tray and place on a cutting board.

I covered the brittle with wax paper and hit it with a meat mallet. Any hammer will do. They should be broken into one to two bite pieces. Dip them halfway into your melted chocolate and place them down on wax paper. Sprinkle or grind sea salt lightly over the pieces trying to get some on the chocolate bits. I have a salt grinder that is set for larger bits of sea salt and works well for this.

Let them cool and they are ready to eat. Brittle is great because you don’t have to be Martha Stewart perfect since they are cracked pieces. Less stressful. As I said before, I like the taste of sweet and salty and these turned out really well and are pretty quick to make. It made about 36 pieces. I did find that these turned out more chewy than hard brittle but delicious all the same. It may have been because of the smaller tray I used. Let me know how yours turns out.

Here’s the full recipe:

Chocolate Dipped Nut Brittle

2 cups of nuts in pieces – Eg. walnuts, cashews, pistachios, pecans, almonds
¼ cup unsalted butter plus a little more for greasing
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 ½ cups granulated sugar
½ cup white corn syrup
1/3 cup water
1 cup of semisweet chocolate chips
1 tsp sea salt or a few twists of the salt grinder to sprinkle

Preheat oven to 350F. Spread the nuts on a cookie sheet and bake until toasted. 8 – 10 minutes, stirring once.

Line a shallow rimmed baking sheet or pan (16” x 10”) with parchment paper and grease lightly with butter. Place the butter, vanilla and baking soda in a small bowl and set aside.

In a heavy bottomed saucepan over high heat, bring sugar, corn syrup and water to a boil, uncovered. Boil sugar over high heat until it turns a light amber colour – about 12 minutes.

Remove from heat and quickly stir in butter, vanilla and baking soda with a wooden spoon. The baking soda will make it foamy. Stir in the nuts until they are completely coated and spoon the mixture into the prepared baking sheet. Try to spread the brittle as thin as possible. Let the brittle cool at room temperature.

Melt the chocolate chips in the microwave on Medium, stirring every 15 seconds or so until melted. Crack the brittle into one or two bite pieces and dip them halfway into the melted chocolate. Place them down on parchment paper and when they have all been dipped, sprinkle or grate lightly with the sea salt. Let the chocolate rest.

Brittle can be made up to 6 days in advance and stored in airtight containers. Don’t freeze.

Enjoy!

Tagged as: chocolate, chocolate recipe, nuts