HM Sweets for Xmas Presents - cheap recipes?

miggy

These are from 'Sweetmaking for Children' by Margaret Powell, pub Piccolo, 1972, except for the chocolate fudge (icing) one, and I can't remember where that's from.
Sorry these are a mixture of metric and Imperial - I gave them in their original form to keep them as accurate as possible but there are conversion calculators on the Net.

Cherry Fudge

1/8 litre milk, 400g. sugar, 115g. butter, 1/8 litre cream, 50g.
glace cherries (and optional - raspberry essence). Heat milk and
sugar together slowly until dissolved. Add butter and cream and stir
till it boils. Keep boiling till it forms a soft ball if a spoonful
is dropped into cold water. Take off the heat, add cherries cut into
quarters and add a tsp. of raspberry essence if you have it. Beat
well till thick and creamy, turn into a greased tin. When almost
cold, mark into squares. Pack in greaseproof paper.

I don't know how long it keeps, as I never get round to it till the
last minute, but you can store it in the fridge for quite a while.

Orange Creams

400g (1lb.) icing sugar, well sieved, 1/2 tsp. lemon juice, 1 orange.

Put sieved sugar in a large basin, grate the orange rind onto it,
add the lemon and a little orange juice. Work together with your
hands till it makes a firm, smooth mass. (Don't overdo the orange at
first or you'll need another box of icing sugar to un-goo it: you
can add more if it won't stick together enough.)

Roll it out till it's 1/8th. inch thick (dust with icing sugar if
it sticks when rolling out), cut into small rounds and set out on
greaseproof paper on a tray you won't be wanting for a while(!) and
leave them to dry and harden. After several hours you can turn them
to let the underside dry.

In my experience it takes several days for them to dry, but it could
be less, depending on your heating. You can coat them in chocolate
if you like, and if you box them, you need to interleave with
greaseproof paper and allow 'breathing space' or they won't keep
long. Otherwise you could make them perhaps a couple of weeks before
needed - I'm guessing! They don't need to be refrigerated.

There are lots of variations on this recipe:

eg. Coffee Almond Creams 400g. icing sugar, coffee essence, 1 egg
white, almonds: mix sugar and coffee, slowly add lightly beaten egg-
white, knead and shape, top each with an almond.

eg.Peppermint Creams 400g. icing sugar, oil of peppermint, 2 egg
whites.

(You can use dried egg white if you prefer, as it's safer.)

Cinder Toffee ('Crunchie' to you and me.)

4oz. sugar, 2 large tbsp. golden syrup, 1 large tbsp. margarine or
butter - dissolve sugar in syrup and butter, slowly over a low heat,
then boil together, stirring, until it begins to darken. Stir in 1
tsp. bicarbonate of soda - it will froth up. Pour into a greased
tin. Mark into squares when cool but not set.

A couple of people I know collect truffle recipes. I've never made
them myself, but they make great presents.

Last and absolutely fabulous is Chocolate Fudge Frosting - supposed
to go on cakes, but if you thickened it (less milk), it would be the
choc. fudge to die for! It keeps for months in the fridge so long as
no-one knows it's there.

3oz. butter, 4oz. sugar, 4 tbsp. milk, 6 oz. sieved icing sugar, 2
oz. cocoa.

Heat butter, sugar and milk gently together till melted. Beat in
icing sugar and cocoa. Cool till thickened.

miggy

HappyIdiotTalk wrote:

I made some fudge once but wasn't that impressed with the results. It was too sweet and a bit grainy. Can anyone diagnose what might have caused those problems as it really put me off making my own ever again. And reading this thread has got me in the mood to try again for Christmas, maybe chocolate fudge!

I'm not absolutely sure but I think it's to do with getting the sugar to dissolve completely before you turn the heat up. Give it a stir when you think it's dissolved then look carefully at the back of the spoon. If there are any grainy bits, it needs to melt a bit longer. Can take a while.
Alternatively try using icing sugar ;-)

miggy

It's just stuck me how ironic my signature is with this thread!
The signature's the wishful thinking, the post contents are the reality

kal25

Hi guys, I googled confectionery recipes and found this site http://www.greenchronicle.com/confectionery_recipes.htm
looks rather interesting and may be of use to some of you. At the moment I have some turkish delight setting in the fridge looks like it might have turned out ok.
:xmastree: :santa2: :rudolf: :snow_laug :xmassign: :xmastree:

magnolia65

I'm gutted

I started this thread and was planning to get some made and have ended up with nothing. Spent last week decorating the hall/stairs/landing and has took 4 full days up. At the moment the guy is here fitting the carpet and the rest of the house is a tip...just have no time left

I'm glad others have got benefit from the thread though

Alfietinker

Sallys_Savings wrote:

I found my boxes in the local stationery shop for 49p each, so its worth looking in there too.
I think wilkinsons did some good boxes too.

Good luck with your fudge.

If anybody is interested I can post how to make cute little origami (sp?) gift boxes from plain paper. It's really easy but I'd have to draw some diagrams. Let me know if you'd like me to.

pinksleepybear

achtunglady wrote:

would love to try and make the marshmallows but i don't eat animal gelatine, would the vegetarian option (vegegel) do just as good a job??

There was a recipe for marshmallows in the Guardian a few weeks ago, with a small section about sourcing the ingredients. It included this section about Vegegel

There are vegetarian, seaweed-derived gelatine substitutes (SuperCook's Vege-Gel, for instance), but these tend to contain additives and don't give satisfactory results in every recipe. They won't, for example, work in this one. So, if you don't want to forgo your marshmallows, you have to accept that you're consuming an ingredient with less than perfect credentials.

Here's the link
http://www.guardian.co.uk/weekend/story/0,,1937518,00.html
and the recipe
http://lifeandhealth.guardian.co.uk/foodanddrink/hughfearnleywhittingstall/story/0,,1939013,00.html

miggy

magnolia65 wrote:

I'm gutted

I started this thread and was planning to get some made and have ended up with nothing. Spent last week decorating the hall/stairs/landing and has took 4 full days up. At the moment the guy is here fitting the carpet and the rest of the house is a tip...just have no time left

I'm glad others have got benefit from the thread though

Making sweets might cheer up a post-Christmas slump - and think how good you'll be next time round after some practice!
OTOH, some sweets take very little time so even now you may have a chance to make some. I once made cinder toffee ('Crunchie') in the morning before school, though I should have allowed it more time to cool and had to take it in later!
I bet the hall/stairs/landing is lovely and worth all the effort.

miggy

Alfietinker wrote:

If anybody is interested I can post how to make cute little origami (sp?) gift boxes from plain paper. It's really easy but I'd have to draw some diagrams. Let me know if you'd like me to.

I nearly missed this - what a good idea! I have seen some made with old greetings cards. I wonder if they're the same?

janb5

miggy wrote:

I nearly missed this - what a good idea! I have seen some made with old greetings cards. I wonder if they're the same?

Yes please - do give us the instructions!