Chocolate-Covered Pumpkin Spice Caramels

You know those days (weeks) when the whole universe is plotting against you?  Sigh.

It all started with a can of pumpkin – one that is still hiding somewhere in my kitchen.

Plan A – My best friend and I were getting together to celebrate our birthdays. As an extra treat, I wanted to make her some pumpkin spice caramels. I poured cream into a pan, turned on the burner, and reached into the cupboard for the pumpkin.  It wasn’t there, so I checked another cabinet, and another, and another. Ack.

Plan B – So the next morning, I added “pick up pumpkin” to my list of errands. Long story short, at the register of the first store I discovered my wallet was still at home.  I finally made it to the supermarket (with the means to purchase the pumpkin), wandered a couple of aisles until I remembered where the pumpkin was, and came upon a great, big hole. Not one can of pumpkin was left. ACK!

Plan C – Okay, so a few days later, I had cream, I had pumpkin, I had butter, and whadda ya know, I had caramel. The next day I took the pan from the fridge so I could cut the candy and bring the treats to work. This probably would have worked better if I had cooked the caramel longer.  ACCKK!

Plan D – Chocolate and caramel, a match made in heaven, right?  I pulled out my candy molds, scooped little balls of soft caramel, and melted some chocolate. Ahhh.

Pumpkin Spice Caramels (from Chasing Some Blue Sky)

1 ½ c heavy cream

1 c canned pumpkin

1 t pumpkin pie spice

2 c sugar

½ c light corn syrup

¼ c water

4 T butter

1 t vanilla

Line an 8 x8 pan with foil and butter pan.

In a medium saucepan, stir together cream, pumpkin, and pumpkin pie spice. Heat the mixture until right before it starts to boil, then remove from heat.

In another (heavy bottomed) pan, stir together sugar, corn syrup, and water.  Over medium heat, boil mixture until it reaches the soft ball stage, 240°F.

Carefully add the pumpkin mixture to the sugar mixture and stir frequently, until the caramel reaches 240°F (I stopped at 230°, which wasn’t quite hot enough for caramel to set completely).

Remove from heat and stir in butter and vanilla.

Pour caramel into the prepared pan and allow to cool completely before cutting candy into pieces.