Homemade Caramel Popcorn

I loooooove caramel. I’m certain that anything slathered in caramel tastes absolutely divine. If you’ve been reading for very long then you know I have a sweet tooth. When I’m craving something sweet I’m envisioning a thick, double chocolate brownie, warmed up with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and caramel dripping down the sides. (oh look, now I’m drooling). So here’s the great thing about caramel popcorn – it’s much better than the alternatives for me.

You can vary this recipe quite a bit to customize it but I’ll give you the base for it to start.

Caramel Popcorn

• 8-ish cups plain popped popcorn (I used my hot air popper to pop 1/2 cup popping corn)
• 1/4 cup butter
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons corn syrup
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla

~Directions:

1. Spread popcorn in (2) 13×9-inch pans. It should be about level with the top but not mounded or you’ll have a tough time stirring.
2. Put butter, corn syrup, brown sugar and vanilla in a saucepan and heat over medium heat until it boils. Stir almost constantly.
3. Pour the caramel over the popcorn in the pans and mix it up.
4. Bake in a 250F degree oven for 40 minutes. Stir 2 or 3 times while it’s cooking.
5. After that, take it out of the oven and lay it on wax paper to cool. You might have to break it up a little while it’s cooling so it doesn’t bunch up (unless, of course, you want it to bunch up because that’s great too).
6. Store in an air-tight container.

~Things to note:

• Using the amount of popcorn I used will yield a very lightly coated mix. If you want your popcorn slathered than you should use less popcorn or double the caramel. My point here is to make a lighter snack for myself.
• Add things to it! Consider nuts of any kind or dry cereals.
• Makes a great gift when packed in something pretty like a tin or jar!

Why I do what I do ~ The girls were having grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch today. My younger niece, who is 2-1/2, told me she wanted bread. I told her that she had bread on her plate. She pointed right to it and said, “No, that’s meat.” I repeated it back to her to make sure I had heard correctly. “That’s meat?” She said, “yes.” Hmmm … then what’s bread?

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Tagged as: Gifts, Recipes