Recipe: Giovanna's Maple Creams

Those of you who know me, know that there is nothing I like more than homemade candy. My dream, of course, is to open a confectionary shop here in San Francisco featuring, truffles, gumdrops, licorice whips, taffy, lollypops, marshmallows, and toffee... all homemade! If it's got sugar in it, I wanna make it.

Maple sugar is really one of my favorite flavors.
I fondly remember driving through Vermont on the way to a ski lodge as a kid, stopping in a shop and asking my parents to buy me a maple sugar candy, usually shaped like a pilgrim or maple leaf, both packed in a stiff boxes with a thick cellophane window. Naturally you bite off the pilgrims head first, then chew your way down to the feet. The maple leafs need to be eaten from the tips of the leaves inward.

When I worked at Chez Panisse, Lindsey Shere's daughter, Giovanna, brought me a recipe for Maple Creams. I immediately made a batch and was hooked. Now I make them every year for the holidays. I recently went to a party that a friend of mine (also formerly from Chez Panisse, who shall remain nameless) was catering. I brought them into the kitchen, and he spirited them away to be served later that evening. After the party he confessed that he ate five of them himself before offering them to any guests!

As I did that night, I often enrobe them in dark, bittersweet chocolate, although they are extraordinarily good without it. If you want to be fancy, after you dip them in chocolate, sprinkle a few finely chopped walnuts over the tops of the candies.

Giovanna's Maple Creams
About 35, depending on how big you cut them

1 cup pure maple syrup (use syrup labeled "Dark amber"–the darker, the better!)
2 cups granulated sugar
1 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup walnut or pecan pieces, toasted

1. Lightly oil a 9- by 9-inch square pan, or a baking sheet.

2. In a small heavy-duty saucepan (about 2 quarts) mix together the maple syrup, sugar, cream, and corn syrup. Fit a candy thermometer to the side of the pan and heat until the temperature reaches 236 degrees, tilting the pan to submerge the bulb, if necessary, to gauge the correct temperature.

3. Remove the pan from the heat and transfer the mixture into the metal bowl of a standing electric mixer. Submerge the thermometer in the candy mixture until it has cooled to 110 degrees, which will take a while. (tip: you can put the bottom of the bowl in ice water to speed up the process; but don't stir the mixture to cool it down).

4. When the temperature is 110 degrees, add the vanilla and beat the mixture until it just begins to thicken and loose its gloss. Overmixing will make it grainy, so keep an eye on it.

5. Stir in the nuts and spread the mixture into the square pan or onto the baking sheet, forming it into a 9-inch square with your (clean) hands.

6. Allow to cool completely, then remove from the pan and cut into squares.

To remove it from a square pan, run a sharp knife around the inside of the pan to loosen it, then cut it in half. Use a metal spatula to pry the candy loose a bit (it will be flexible). Invert the pan a shake it to coax the maple cream candy out.