Sugar and Spice
Sugar: is there nothing it can’t do? It adds moisture and structure to cakes and cookies, not to mention sweetness to our lips. When it comes to winter holiday time, here are some of our favourite ways to put it to good use.
Sugared rims
A subtly sugared rim adds a bit of sparkle to your cocktails. Grab a glass, a lime or lemon, a plate and some sugar. Slit the citrus, paint your glass. Fill a plate with sugar then dip the glass in the sugar or hold it on a 45-degree angle to subtly crust just one side. For added flavour add cinnamon, nutmeg or even a hint of ground cayenne.
Sugared fruit
Sugared fruit makes a beautiful centrepiece and sugared cranberries popped into soda water look great and make a festive bite. Sugared fruit can be painted with either gelatine or egg whites (use the powdered version or pasteurized kind) before being dipped into sugar and being left to dry. Fine berry sugar works best. There’s no doubt that Vancouver’s damp climate can makes things like this difficult, so pick a drier day if you can. Avoid putting the fruit in a closed container, which will only contain the moisture and prevent drying. Also it’s a good idea to use fruit that’s less ripe — it will last longer.
Sugared nuts
A holiday favourite, candied nuts make a great snack, always come in handy when visitors pop by and double as a beautiful gift when packaged up nicely. These ones are made with a sugar mix of hot smoked paprika and cinnamon and deliver a subtle heat-backed sweetness.
2 teaspoons olive oil
¾ cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon sea salt
1½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon hot smoked Spanish paprika
1 egg white
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 cups raw almonds
Preheat oven to 250 F. Brush a baking sheet with the olive oil and set aside. In a large bowl, combine sugar, salt, cinnamon, and paprika and set aside. In another bowl, whisk together egg white and vanilla by hand until foamy. Add the almonds and stir to coat completely. Using a slotted spoon, add the coated almonds to the sugar mixture and stir well to thoroughly coat with the sugar and spices. Transfer the almonds to the baking sheet and arrange evenly in one layer. Bake for one hour, stirring every 15 minutes. After an hour, remove from oven and stir once more and allow the nuts to cool completely before packing into jars. Fills a one litre jar or two 500 ml jars.
Sugar plums
The stuff of Christmas rhymes, these round balls of mixed dried fruit and almonds are flavoured with a party of spices, including caraway seeds, cinnamon, nutmeg and mace, the outer covering of the nutmeg. Mace tastes similar to nutmeg but has a more subtle and complex flavour. Look for whole mace, sometimes called mace blade, sold separately to nutmeg in spice shops. These sweet treats make a tasty energy bite to help you power through a cold winter’s hike or enjoy with a cup of tea when you return.
½ cup almonds, slivered
¼ cup almond flour
¼ cup prunes, chopped
¼ cup dried apricots, chopped
¼ cup dates, chopped
¼ cup dried cranberries
½ teaspoon caraway seeds
½ teaspoon mace blade filaments
¼ teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
2 tablespoons honey
½ cup coarse sugar for rolling
Pinch of salt
In a dry pan, toast caraway seeds and mace for about 2 minutes over medium heat. Add to a bowl or mortar and pestle and mix with cinnamon, nutmeg and salt, crushing up the mace filaments with the back of a spoon if you don’t have a mortar and pestle. The caraway seeds will be crushed slightly but will remain largely intact in the process.
Preheat oven to 350 F. Lay the slivered almonds on one side of the baking sheet and the almond flour in a single layer on the other. Bake for 6 minutes, stirring once. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
In the bowl of a food processor, place dried fruit and slivered almonds. Pulse until the almonds are broken up and all the fruit pieces are uniform. Stop machine and add the spice mixture, honey and the toasted almond flour Pulse again until the mixture is well combined and you can press it into a ball that holds. Line a baking sheet or tray with parchment paper. Use a cookie scoop to make one-tablespoon portions. Roll each into a ball and place on the parchment paper. Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve. Bring to room temperature and just before serving, roll each ball in coarse sugar.
