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Burnt Sugar Almonds (Gebrannte Mandeln)

4.97 Mitt(s) 42 Rating(s)42 votes, average: 4.97 out of 542 votes, average: 4.97 out of 542 votes, average: 4.97 out of 542 votes, average: 4.97 out of 542 votes, average: 4.97 out of 5

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Description

There are many things I associated with Advent/Christmas time growing up in Germany. But none more than the deliciously enticing smell of fresh “burnt” almonds walking through a Christkindlmarkt (German Christmas markets). They are actually quite easy to make at home, and presented in cute little cellophane or paper cone bags, they make lovely favors or hostess gifts around this time of year, too!

Ingredients

  • ⅓ cups Water, Plus 2 Tablespoons
  • 1-⅓ cup Sugar, Divided
  • 1 teaspoon Cinnamon, Ground
  • 2 cups Raw Almonds
  • 1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract

Preparation

Use a heavy saucepan (NOT the nonstick kind) and a wooden spoon.

First add the water, 1 cup of sugar and the cinnamon and stir. Bring it to a boil over medium heat. Add the almonds to the mix, raise the temperature to high heat and stir CONSTANTLY until the water is boiled away.

The sugar will dry out a little but start to stick to the almonds. Keep stirring them around, so that the almonds don’t burn on the bottom of the pan.

Turn the heat under the pan to medium-low, to keep the sugar from browning too fast. Keep stirring until the almonds start having an even shiny coat.

Don’t be distracted by the heavenly aroma that is enveloping your kitchen—you need your full concentration on the task!

Now dump in the rest of your sugar. Keep stirring, and add your vanilla. At this point, I like to mention that if you have vanilla sugar or a powdered type of vanilla flavoring, do feel free to use that over the liquid kind. It tends to work better. If you do, mix it with the 1/3 of a cup of sugar you are using for the second lot of sugar.

At this point, there might be quite some noise ensuing from your pan. Some crackling and popping, but hopefully no snapping. It depends on how fresh your almonds were. Really fresh almonds will make a popping noise and the coat may start to crack. That’s the water in the almonds escaping. If the almonds are older, there won’t be as much of that!

Keep stirring until the almonds are fairly shiny, but still a bit lumpy. You don’t want them completely smooth. The best ones are the ones that are shiny in some areas with some delicious lumps of cinnamon sugar on other parts of the almond.

As soon as you see that happening, take them off the heat and transfer the almonds to a sheet of parchment paper. Spread them apart as much as you can, but don’t worry about some of them sticking together initially. BE CAREFUL, however. These are extremely hot, so only use a spoon. These babies can really burn you!

While they are cooling down, keep on breaking them apart with your spoon(s) until they are all separated. Fair warning: these are totally divine when they are still ever-so-slightly warm. There, you’ve been warned!

Once they are cooled, hide (ahem, I meant store) them in a dry, closed container. Theoretically, they keep for several weeks. I’ve never had an opportunity to test that theory.

36 Comments

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cheeks mcgee on 2.9.2011

I made these – to much acclaim, compliments, and requests for more – as Christmas gifts this year. Great recipe, although mine turned out a bit different – instead of a sandy coating as pictured, I followed the recipe wording until the sugar re-melted into a candy coating. I like these better than the sandy-sugar one I tried out of the pan. A little different, but yummy all the same. http://thecheekykitchen.com/?p=280

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bonniebenedict on 1.31.2011

I made these for Christmas — so very yummy!! I think I will make them Valentines day and Easter and ….
Thanks for the the recipe!

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Leilani on 1.1.2011

I made these yesterday as a New Years Eve treat for the kids. I added a spoon of cocoa powder to the sugar and water at the beginning and the finished product was delicious.

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Natalie | Perry's Plate on 12.24.2010

I’ve doubled this recipe before and it turned out OK. I added the additional sugar and vanilla while the existing sugar was still syrup-y. (See the Tasty Kitchen Blog for the step-by-step.) That keeps you from having a pot of sugar with almonds floating around (that’s how my first two batches came out :)) Good luck!

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lovetobake on 12.22.2010

I made this yesterday and here’s the problems I had. I doubled the recipe (which I’m not sure was a good idea). Everything was going well (the water was evaporating and the almonds were shiny and the smell was INCREDIBLE) but as soon as I added the additional sugar and vanilla, I couldn’t get them shiny again. Some of the sugar stuck but a lot of it didn’t. When I poured it out onto the parchment I didn’t have to separate the almonds at all and there was probably a good 1 1/2 cups of sugar not adhered to the almonds. What did I do wrong? Was it because I doubled it?

All that aside….they were still DELICIOUS!

42 Reviews

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kittykat86 on 2.5.2013

These are wonderful! Hubby and I love them.

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kender3 on 12.24.2011

Very simple and good. If making pecan, I suggest toasting the pecans first. Did have sugar left over.

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Heidi Malott on 12.12.2011

I have made these twice already and will be making them for Christmas presents. Thank you for sharing. I am so happy to have this recipe!

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einnoch on 6.16.2011

I have made them multiple times and they are always wonderful. Just made a batch for my Aunts 84 birthday, she doesn’t want stuff, so give her something wonderful to munch on. This is a wonderful recipe. LOVE IT!!!

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Allison on 4.6.2011

I had these at Christmas growing up. I’m so glad to have the recipe now. They’re fantastic.

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