Christmas Treats (Part 1)

I am like probably every other person on Christmas Planet as I make food gifts for my neighbor's and friends during the holidays. 

I usually make a few staple things. Molasses cookies, assorted nuts, and sugar cookies. For my sugar cookies I make the ones from Bee In Our Bonnet. I would talk about them here, but really there's no point.  Ashleigh from Bee In Our Bonnet does such a great job with her pictures and details, that I just couldn't do it justice. Also Her cookie and frosting recipe is divine and probably one of the only recipes I don't mess with. 

Anyway.... This year for treats I decided to do something different. My sister and I teamed up and she made the pecans (because I am allergic) and I did the others. I still did the sugar cookies. Mostly because Christmas isn't Christmas without sugar cookies. I also did biscotti, peppermint bark, and chocolate almond toffee. This post is about the toffee. The peppermint bark will be in Part 2. 

Ingredients

•  2 cup2 (4 sticks) butter, cut up
•  3 cups granulated sugar
•  2 tablespoon light corn syrup
•  1 cup chopped almonds plus 1/4 finely chopped almonds
•  24 ounces (4 cups) dark chocolate chips

What To Do:

1. Line a half-sheet jelly-roll pan or 2 15 x 10 x 1) with foil and either spray it with cooking oil or brush it with canola oil. In a medium saucepan, heat butter, sugar, corn syrup and 1/4 cup water. Heat over medium heat to melt butter. Increase heat to medium-high and insert candy thermometer.

2. Cook mixture about 12 minutes until golden brown and temperature reaches 300 degrees F. Do not stir. Remove from heat and remove thermometer. 

(I used a pot that was *almost* too small. Be careful not to make this mistake!)

3. Quickly pour toffee onto prepared pan(s) and spread to edges with an off set spatula. The toffee sets pretty quickly so you will need to work fast. Let stand in pan on a wire rack for 30 minutes. The wire rack part is pretty important as the bottom of the pan needs to cool as well as the top. 

4. Melt half of the chocolate in microwave on HIGH in 30 second intervals. Stir to smooth after each heating. Spread over top of cooled toffee with the offset spatula.  Refrigerate (or put it outside in winter) for 20 minutes until firm.

5. Once firm, flip entire bar over onto waxed paper and remove the foil. Microwave remaining chocolate just as before. Spread over the toffee and sprinkle with almonds. Press the almonds gently on the the chocolate. Refrigerate 20 minutes more. 

6. The chocolate needs to be very firm before breaking. If it is not firm, the chocolate will separate from the toffee. Break into 2-1/2-inch pieces. Store airtight at room temperature. It stays good for about a month. But it never lasts that long. :)