Making My Own Crunchies

[OllieMartin]

My brother, an accomplished failure in the kitchen, made honeycomb the other day out of one of his 5-year-old son's cook books. It was so good and so easy it gave me an idea.
I thought I'd make some, pour it into bar-shaped moulds and then chocolate coat it to make homemade Crunchies for the family as part of their assortment of Christm-you-know-what presents.
Any suggestions or ideas with regards to the chocolate? I'm not very experienced with my pudding-type cooking so not sure what to expect.

[Nicos]

I usually gently melt real chocolate in the microwave. A few seconds at at time once you've broken it into pieces. It's very easy to burn or make it bubble- bit like Aero- so just stir it loads and loads.
The nice thing about Crunchie bars is that they don't use cooking chocolate.
I'd be tempted to dip smallish pieces in the chocolate- turn them over to set- then give them a second dunking.
Are you going to share the recipe???...

[Bigmallly]

Melt some milky bars Ollie..........Make them a bit different.

[OllieMartin]

The recipe couldn't be easier, although I don't have the one he did, I found this on Google in an instant:

•100g caster sugar
•3 tablespoons of Golden Syrup
•1 teaspoon of Bicarbonate of Soda

1.Mix the caster sugar and golden syrup together in a pan
2.Put the pan on a low heat
3.Slowly stir with a sugar thermometer until it reaches about 300F / Hard Crack. I found this took about 10 minutes
4.Add the bicarbonate of soda and stir very quickly and very well
5.Poor onto a pan with baking tray covered with baking parchment
6.Leave to cool

I like the Milky Bar idea, will experiment as I can't see it being particularly costly.

[di]

The Co op's Fairtrade bars are good & because they're thin fairly easy to melt.(I sometimes find with chunkier chocolate,unless you chop it before melting,the melted bits burn before the unmelted bits melt.)Green & Blacks would work too.

[HayleyB]

Don't make them too big as the end result is delish but too much is sickly. I made honeycomb donkeys ago but it was called something else then, can't remember what though

[wollyanna]

Cinder Toffee its sometimes called. My son-in-law who consoders himself a very accomplished cook tried three times to have a go but it didn't work. Perhaps I'll e-mail him Ollies recipe.

[HayleyB]

Nope it wasn't that, it's gonna drive me nuts now.........

[HayleyB]

Got it - Hokey Pokey - Phew

[Jeanied]

I think in Belfast they used to call it Yellow Man - but I may be deluded!

[Bren In Pots]

I've seen recopies for this but they add vinegar, not sure why though.

[grannymem]

I found this recipe on the web:@ Hokey Pokey, apparently oringinally a New Zealand recipe
Ingredients
* 4 tablespoons sugar
* 1 teaspoon baking soda
* 2 tablespoons golden syrup

Directions

1. Bring the sugar and the golden syrup to the boil, slowly stirring all the time.
2. Boil for 7 minutes, stirring occasionally.
3. Remove from heat and add soda.
4. Stir in quickly until it froths and pour at once into a greased tin.
5. Break up when cold.
6. Store in an airtight tin.

I haven't got a sugar thermometer so I think I might have a go with this recipe

[amandaandherveg]

It used to be called Puff Candy in our neck of the woods.

[smallblueplanet]

I've seen recopies for this but they add vinegar, not sure why though.

I don't know but I imagine the acid/vinegar would react with the bicarb/baking soda and froth more?

[SarzWix]

Yeah, that's true Manda; the kids do it at school as a 'scientific experiment'. They come home with a papier-mache 'volcano' and pester you for all your vinegar & bicarb to do an eruption...