Hi and a huge welcome to Steve's kitchen
Today I'm going to be teaching you how
to make a dark treacle at home. Now some
of you may not know what a dark treacle
is, if maple syrup were the queen of syrups
then dark treacle is the king of
syrups. How can I possibly say that, well
if you're like me and you like the corner
of the crumble or even the lasagna, if
you'll take the fruit off of a fruitcake.
You know that dark little raisin that's
poking out and make a hole there because
the caramel flavors, if you like the top
of a creme brulee, you are going to love
dark treacle but imagine if you could
just have the corner of the apple pie
but a lot of it, just a plateful of it
well you know it would be too rich and
that is where treacle or dark treacle
anyway is that intense caramel flavor and
it's why it makes such a great baking
accompaniment because when you add it to
something that you cook, it disperses the
flavor of burnt caramel throughout
in some ways its similar to a molasses but
because of the burnt sugar content in
here it is even more intense. Let me give it
a little try and explain to you the flavors.
I get. It's super super sticky stuff so
be careful with it and you don't need
very much to sample this. Here goes, that is
one of the most intense caramel flavors
towards the sort of smokiness even
aniseed maybe a little bit of licorice
really intense so you can imagine
cooking with this is going to be
fantastic.
It was some surprised me when I made the
golden syrup in a previous episode that
so many people were interested in making
this dark treacle, so let's get on now and
I'll show you how to make it.
luckily it is not so complicated we're
just going to take 200 grams that's seven and a
half ounces of granulated sugar, pop it
into a pot and I'm going to add about a
quarter cup of water in with that as well
thats just to help the sugars to dissolve,
it's already heating up and we don't want to
stir the sugar at all although we're less
worried about crystallization because
we're taking these sugars up to a
very high temperature indeed actually
towards 200 degrees Celsius or 400
Fahrenheit beyond the point where the
sugars have burnt we want to get a real
dark nutty color in these sugars. Now I
should say be very very careful when
you're working with sugars at these
temperatures,it's twice as hot as boiling water.
So don't let the children near it at all
and be very cautious. Now at this point
all of the water has boiled off of the
sugars and we're just starting to see, I
don't know if you can see in there some little blonde
colors coming through and the smell of
the sugar will change a little bit
you'll start to get a real smell of
caramel coming off the sugar now. Do be
prepared for the smell of burnt sugar I
actually quite like it, it's a very rich smell
but it will fill the house.Now
soon after the caramelization stage
you're going to start to get towards the
stage of burnt sugar and the smells are
going to get more intense but we're
going to keep cooking this on past the
burnt sugar stage. Now a candy
thermometer would be very useful but it
is not essential
I tend to do this by eye and you can see now
in the corner there If I were to put the
thermometer in we would probably be getting
up to about close to the 200 degrees
Celsius that's 400 fahrenheit and you
can see now if I give that a little shake
through the sugars are very very liquid
and most of the sugars have started to
go from a nutmeg brown to a really
dark walnut brown. I want to cook this
even further, the smell is going to be a
little bit sour but I want all of these
sugars to be as dark as possible.
Now a few moments later the sugars are
starting to go a nice even black and the
smell is even more intense, another
minute or so and I'm going to turn this
heat off. Now you can see on the end of
the thermometer just how dark those
caramels are getting. At this point I'm
going to turn the heat off be very
careful this is super hot now. I'm going
to let it cool a little bit not much, if
you were to let that completely cool
down it would be like black glass in
the bottom of the pot, very difficult to
work with, we have to add some more sugars and
some more water, if we add any liquid
into this it's going to be quite volatile,
so you have to be very careful and make
sure any water we use is already boiling.
Now the burnt sugars have cooled just a
little bit in the pan and I've got 500
grams of sugar that's about 1.1 pounds
I'm just going to pour that in over the
top of the sugar, then I've got water
from a kettle here and be very very
careful
I'm going to be adding in approximately
a cup as the water comes in contact with
the hot sugars it may fizz a little
bit. I'm going to turn my heat back on
see how the black sugars had solidified
next important process is we're just
going to take a quarter of a lemon I'm
going to squeeze out the juice out of
the lemon and gently drop it into my
treacle. The reason we're putting the
lemon in there is to stop any further
caramelisation of the new sugars and
there's a chemical reaction between the
lemon acids and the sucrose in the
sugar and we're going to encourage the
formation of some fructose as well. Now
you can see the burnt sugars are still
in the liquid there so what we're going
to do is let this simmer away. Now
keep an eye on it make sure it doesn't over
boil, we want it to simmer for about 35 to
40 minutes to allow the sugars that are
in there to dissolve. Now a good example
of a recipe that uses black treacle on
my channel is the Yorkshire parkin,
which is just delicious and a
subscriber on the channel, Calo
MacKinnon by the way mentioned Treacle
scones and I'm going to use the homemade
dark treacle to make those scones in an
upcoming recipe and they are absolutely
gorgeous
Now I'm just checking the temperature there
it's been about 35 minutes I'm getting
about 119 degrees celsius so my sugar
temperatures are starting to get to firm
ball and that's where a candy
thermometer can be quite useful. Now the
final stage we have to just find the
right balance we've taken basically a hard
cracked toffee and added it to what would
be a soft or firm ball sugar and we've
got to make sure that when that cools
down that it is like a very thick syrup
and doesn't
set hard. So what I want to do is just
take a small piece from the pan on a
wooden spoon and drop it onto a cold
surface like the back of a pan lid and
let that cool for a minute or so. Now if
when that's cool it is set firm it's
too hard
I've got this so it's actually quite
like a nice thick syrup and it is
finding that right balance, if it sets
firm, add about five to ten percent of
boiling water into it, that's about a quarter of
a cup at a time until you get the
consistency when cooled feels right for
a treacle. The flip side of that if
it's too watery then just carry on
simmering it for a bit longer. I'm happy
with my dark treacle so I've got a
sterilized mason jar
I'm going to sieve this through, just to get any
bits of lemon that might be in there and I'm
just going to pour it into the mason jar
and of course as that cools down it's
going to thicken up
Actually when I made the golden syrup
two or three people said it looked too
runny but I can tell you when it cools
down just come in here
the golden syrup is just as you would
expect it to be, lovely and thick and so
will the dark treacle but for the moment
it's super hot, I'm going to let this cool
down but join me in the next episode
where we're going to be taking this
treacle and making treacle scones, which
are absolutely to die for,
they are so delicious as I said to you
before imagined that dark caramelized
edge of any pie that you've enjoyed and
then sprinkle it through the most
delicious scone. See you then take care