OVHA Chat

Making my own candy sugar for the first time! Going to use some in my Trappist single this weekend. Thanks to Jeremy D. for the suggestion.

I've had success making light candy sugar using sugar + water + heat + acid, but when I tried to make it darker it had a burnt/metallic flavor.

Here's some info on making dark candy syrup. Looks promising. I'm going to give these methods a try and see if I can get anything similar to the commercial syrups.

https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/ ... pic=6702.0
http://ryanbrews.blogspot.com/2012/02/c ... -been.html

Moving the candi syrup/sugar discussion to this thread...

I've made several batch of this so far using a slightly modified version of the process Cesar linked to in the OVHA Bourbon Barrel Quad thread.

http://www.ovha.net/phpBB3/viewtopic.ph ... 9&start=15
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=114837

I used slightly different temperatures each time, but I think my favorite is:

2 lbs sugar
1 cup water
3/4 tsp pickling lime
2 tsp wyeast beer yeast nutrient (I don't have plain DAP)

1. Dissolve lime and yeast nutrient in water
2. Combine with sugar and heat over medium heat to 295 F (watch it carefully!)
3. Add 1 cup water
4. Bring back to 280 F
5. Add 1.5 cups water
6. Bring to 240 F (soft ball)
7. Immediately pour into a preheated quart mason jar. (preheat by boiling the jar as you would for canning)

I'll bring some samples to the meeting.

Excellent!! Does it have to go in mason jar? Can you just pour on parchment paper on a cookie sheet, let cool and crack?

This method makes a thick syrup, but I if you heat it up to the hard crack temp at the end (295 - 309 F) you could make hard candy.