Spicy Peanut Brittle Recipe (Using Leftover Cowboy Candy Syrup) - Our Little Homestead (2024)

FAQs

Can you reuse cowboy candy brine? ›

Yes, you can reuse the brine from cowboy candy to make a second batch of pickled jalapenos. Cowboy candy is a delicious and versatile condiment that's easy to make at home. With its sweet and spicy flavor, it's perfect for adding a bit of heat to sandwiches, burgers, and other dishes.

Literally anything. Top a burger, a bagel and cream cheese or a pizza. Chop and add to any salad, especially ones where you might otherwise use pickle relish — egg, chicken or potato salad, for example — or dips and sandwich spreads. They elevate nachos to a religious experience.

Baking soda is a key ingredient in peanut brittle. It's what aerates the candy, giving it a nice light crunch. Why didn't my homemade peanut brittle get hard? The main reason why peanut brittle doesn't get hard and have the crunch we expect is because the sugar was not cooked long enough.

No one is quite sure how the catchy name came to be, but it's stuck around, just like everyone's love of 'em. Can I use frozen jalapeños for cowboy candy? Save your frozen jalapeños for another recipe—fresh is best here! If you use frozen peppers, they'll turn out far too mushy.

Cowboy candy is another name for candied jalapeños. Because jalapeños are a spicy pepper bursting with flavor, they're perfect to be pickled and sweetened up. By boiling them with sugar and vinegar, you create a beautiful balance between sweet, spicy, and acidic.

What does cowboy candy taste like? Cowboy candy tastes sweet with a little heat—almost like bread and butter pickles with a zing and a kick.

If you're a newbie to this condiment, like me, cowboy candy is a colloquial name for sliced jalapeños in a sweet and tangy syrup. They are a great addition to sandwiches, salads or nachos and really shine when paired with cheese.

Some other great ideas include serving over baked brie, on salads, on a burger or hot dog, or even right out of the jar!

Why did my peanut brittle turn out chewy? The likely cause is that the sugar mixture didn't reach the proper hard crack stage temperature. Ensuring it reaches 300˚F is key to getting that classic brittle texture.

What makes peanut brittle too hard? ›

Why is it too hard? Using baking soda usually prevents peanut brittle from being too, well, brittle. However, if you cook the candy past the set temperature or overwork the candy once you spread it out onto the cookie sheet, that can cause it to become very hard and difficult to bite through.

Those other liquid sugars have impurities that will burn at the higher temperature of making caramel, leading to a bitter-tasting brittle.

The mixture will foam and grow so make sure to stir constantly to completely incorporate. Working quickly, pour into prepared 10×15 pan. To keep the brittle light and airy, do not spread or flatten the mixture. Instead, let it flow freely.

As we said, the biggest enemy to the longevity of your peanut brittle is moisture. Whether it's during the cooking, cooling, or storage process, moisture and humidity can ruin the best batch of brittle in minutes, leaving you with a soggy, sticky mess.

It uses the most basic of ingredients (sugar, corn syrup, and peanuts). What's important to know is that the corn syrup controls the grain of the brittle so adding too little and you have a grainy textured brittle, while adding too much will result in a stringy and sticky brittle.

The most obvious use of pickle brine is to make more pickles. Have a handful of fresh cucumbers, carrots, or jalapenos? Reuse the spicy brine to make another batch of delicious, tangy pickles.

Reuse the brine to make more pickles out of different fruits and veggies. Carrots, mushrooms, beets, radishes, green beans (aka dilly beans), the list goes on. Optional: spice it up with hot peppers. Deviled eggs.

“Absolutely yes, you can reuse pickle brine,” says Phillip Bec of McClure's Pickles. Mark Hungarland, the co-founder of Doux South Pickles, agrees. "We have always encouraged our customers to reuse our brines," Hungarland tells Southern Living. "It is such a waste to dump the brine after the pickles are gone."

Yes, you can reuse the leftover sugar syrup. If you want to make more rock candy, just heat it up with an additional cup of sugar, to replace the sugar that grew on the previous stick.