Aside from a delicious foray into chocolate-covered bacon, I’ve never really been a candy-maker. I didn’t even own a candy thermometer until recently. But after discovering the natural pectins in figs while I was cooking up some fig jam a while back, I wondered if I couldn’t just keep on cooking the fig jam until it became a gel-like candy.
So this week I harvested another batch of figs (the last of the season, I think) and set about making my usual jam recipe. I cooked it down until it was a gelatinous mess, then let it cool down so it wasn’t burning hot. I spread the glop over a sheet of plastic that I had dusted liberally with powdered sugar, dusted more sugar on top, and let the flattened mass cool completely.
When it was cool, I simply sliced the gel into slices and then into squares, and tossed each square in more powdered sugar. The soft texture is somewhere between caramel and jam, with chewy lemon peel bits here and there. They’re good little bites!
Unfortunately the powdered sugar coating isn’t quite so fluffy a few days later. I’m not sure how they get the dusting on Turkish Delight to stay so nice. Ah well, just another candy secret to learn.
This looks very delicious! I love figs and I can imagine how good this can taste!
You can try mixing the powdered sugar with some corn starch. That’s what I did when I made marshmallows, and they stayed nice and fluffy!
Mmmm, that looks yummy. I wonder if it would be good with a cheese plate – like, if you didn’t coat it in the powdered sugar in the end.
When I’ve had Turkish Delight, it comes so that each little individual candy sits in its own little container – I think that helps maintain the powdered sugar coat.
oh to have enough figs to experiment!!!
I finally planted two of my potted fig trees in the grounds, so in 4 years or so, should have enough for that, right?
That is one thing I miss from my prior garden in the city: the fig trees (I had three!). But I only have myself to blame for not having planting some earlier here (I could not decide where).
I’ll try to remember this good idea for when the fig bumper crop is here!