Chocolate & Candy qt
Caramel Batch Size Calculator
Scale caramel sauce, salted caramel, soft caramel candies or the caramel for flan to exactly what you need, with cooking temperatures and a pot big enough for the foam.
How to use it
- Choose the kind of caramel.
- Enter how much sauce you want, your candy pan, or your flan molds.
- Measure everything first and use a pot at least the size shown: caramel foams up when the cream goes in.
How it works
Each caramel has a tested base recipe, scaled by the sauce volume, the pan area for candies, or the molds for flan.
Hot sugar and cream foam to several times their volume, so the pot should hold at least four times the ingredients. Candy texture is set by the final temperature: 245°F is soft, 248°F chewy and 252°F firm.
Assumptions and limits
- Candy temperatures are for sea level; lower them at altitude.
- Sauce yields vary slightly with how dark you cook the caramel.
Tips
- Use a heavy, light-colored pot so you can judge the color.
- Warm the cream before adding it; cold cream seizes the caramel.
- Soak sticky pots in hot water: the caramel dissolves on its own.
Recipes to try it with
Questions
How much caramel sauce does 1 cup of sugar make?
About 1⅓ cups, with butter and cream.
What temperature for soft caramels?
245 to 248°F (118 to 120°C) for soft and chewy, 250 to 252°F for firm.
Why did my caramel crystallize?
Stirring the sugar before it melts, or sugar crystals on the pot sides. Swirl instead of stirring, and add a spoon of corn syrup.
How do I fix caramel sauce that's too thick?
Warm it and stir in a little hot cream until it's as loose as you like.