Whole Lotta Panna Cotta (…wait a second)

This week, Mia and I made panna cotta with caramel sauce and caramel candy coated hazelnuts.  On the first day, we prepared the panna cotta.  Here is how we did it:

After lining four ramekins with non-stick cooking spray, we poured 1 cup of whole milk into a saucepan and sprinkled 2 teaspoons of unflavored powdered gelatin on top.  We let this mixture sit for 5 minutes to soften.

Next, we set the saucepan over low heat and warmed the milk mixture while whisking.  There was one point at which we started to see steam, so we took the saucepan off of the heat to let it cool for a few seconds.  After about 2 minutes, we rubbed some of the mixture between our fingers to check to see that it felt smooth.  This would mean that the gelatin had dissolved.

We then stirred 1/4 cup of sugar into the mixture and continued warming until the sugar had dissolved.  Then, we removed the saucepan from the heat, and whisked in 1 cup of heavy cream, 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract, and a pinch of salt.  We distributed this mixture evenly among our ramekins, and refrigerated them overnight.

On the second day, we started out by making the caramel sauce.  Before doing anything, we filled a small bowl with cold water and placed it by our workstation in case either one of us burned ourselves.

After taking the necessary safety precautions, we heated 7 tablespoons of unsalted butter and 1.5 cups of heavy cream in our saucepan until the butter melted.  When it was done, we poured this mixture into a glass measuring cup and put it off to the side.

After cleaning out our saucepan, which took a long time, we combined 2 cups of sugar and 1/2 cup of water, stirring them together until the sugar had been evenly moistened and a thick grainy paste had formed.

After wiping down the sides of the pot with non-stick cooking spray, we clipped a thermometer to the side of the pot and started cooking the sugar syrup.  We placed the pot over medium heat.  Once it hit 240 degrees Fahrenheit, the sugar syrup started to boil.

At 320 degrees Fahrenheit, the sugar syrup started to turn into caramel.  Once the caramel was a bit lighter than our goal color, we slowly whisked in the hot cream and butter mixture.  Then, we quickly whisked 2 teaspoons of salt into the mixture.  We then poured the mixture into a glass measuring cup and let it cool to a temperature close to room temperature.

While we waited, we moved on to making the caramel candy covered hazelnuts.  We started by roasting our hazelnuts for 12 minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit.  We then inserted a toothpick into each hazelnut.

We repeated the caramelization process for the candy coating, this time only using 3 tablespoons of water and 4.5 tablespoons of sugar.  We accidentally left our sugar syrup on the burner for too long and ended up with very dark, bitter caramel.  Regardless, we did use it.  We dipped each hazelnut into the caramel to coat it.

Now that we had our caramel sauce and our hazelnuts, it was time to retrieve the panna cotta from the refrigerator.  We removed each one from its ramekin by running a knife around the sides of the inside of the ramekin, then pouring it out onto the plate.

We topped each one with caramel sauce and hazelnuts, and our dish was complete!

Questions:

1. Darker caramel is less sweet because the darker color indicates that the glucose and fructose within has decomposed into aroma molecules, which escape into the air.  This leaves the caramel with a bitter taste.
2. We saw caramelization occurring at around 320 degrees Fahrenheit, just like the lab said it would.  We could tell caramelization had started because the sugar syrup started to turn brown.