Bonjour my friends, I’m Frankie and welcome to Club Foody!
With our busy schedules, David and I try to dedicate at least 1 movie night
a week… it’s a good way to be entertained and take our mind off work.
As much as we enjoy light salted chips with my onion dip, my party mix, homemade salsa
or beer cheese dip, there’s another one that is perfect for that special night…
In today’s episode, I’ll show you how to make my Homemade Cracker Jack!
It’s ridiculously easy to make and takes just a little time. The beauty of making it
from scratch is you can adjust the sweetness as well as the saltiness to your liking. This is
perfect for movie night… the only thing missing is the little toy! So my friends, let’s get cooking!
We’ll go ahead and make popcorn. I use my hot air machine but you can always use a big pot with oil
over the stovetop or the ones they sell for the microwave which I don’t think taste anything
fantastic but hey, it’s just my opinion. Bottom line is the amount we need is about 14 cups of
these fluffy little guys and try not to eat half of them. When this step is done and we discarded
any un-popped kernels, we’ll add roasted peanuts – I like the light seasoned ones but you can always
use the redskin. We’ll stir and if the bowl is not big enough, we’ll split with another one.
Before moving on to the stove, we’ll prep two large baking sheets by brushing on some flavorless
oil at the bottom and up the rims as well then we’ll set aside. All right so in a saucepan over
medium-high heat, we’ll add butter followed by brown sugar then corn syrup and for those
of you who can’t find any in your area, I have a homemade recipe so click on the top right corner
of your screen to get it. We’ll also add molasses and ¼ tsp. ground sea salt. We’ll stir until the
ingredients are nicely blended and then hook a candy thermometer on the side of our saucepan.
We’ll cook the caramel until it reaches 250ºF which it should take about 5 to 6 minutes.
We’ll remove it from the heat right away and add some pure vanilla extract as well as baking soda.
We’ll stir very well and we’ll see the color and the texture changing – look at this,
it’s so beautiful… it reminds me of when I make my Grandma’s Crunchie Bars… mmm, love it!
Without waiting any longer, we’ll pour it over our popcorn-peanut mixture.
Now that’s the hardest part of the recipe because we have to be quick and coat the popcorn before
the caramel hardens… so let’s not take our time doing it. We’ll now add the popcorn mixture onto
the prepared baking sheets trying to spread it out in a single layer. We’ll add more ground
sea salt - obviously to taste - and transfer the sheets to a 200ºF preheated oven. We’ll bake for
25 to 30 minutes or until the popcorn mixture is drier. When time is up, we’ll carefully remove the
baking sheets from the heat and let the popcorn mixture sit for a few minutes to dry furthermore
before transferring to a bucket or a bowl… Get the remote control and let’s watch a movie!
And my friends, this is our Homemade Cracker Jack!
What a delicious easy recipe young and older really enjoy! The big plus about it is it can
be made ahead of time plus you can adjust to your liking. This snack is perfect for parties,
a baseball game or when watching a movie which is what I’ll be doing tonight!
I hope you give it a try soon and be sure to visit clubfoody.com for ingredient amounts,
directions and more info… Until next time my friends, bon appétit!