Salted Caramel Sauce (Caramel au beurre salé)
This has to be one of the most satisfying of homemade sauces: it’s so handy to keep in the fridge. Ever since my sweet French friend, Emmanuelle, showed me how to make it, I have been in salted caramel heaven; in Autumn and Winter there’s now a constant supply of this sticky nectar in the fridge. And I mean it’s so constant, it’s on a drip!
It can jazz up scores of desserts, adding an extra wow factor to the most simplest of sweet treats. What’s more, it keeps for up to a month sealed in the refrigerator.
When ready to serve, transfer to a small milk jug, reheat gently in the microwave and dribble or zig-zag over vanilla ice cream (see p125), waffles, profiteroles, chocolate fondants, crêpes, rice puddings, poached pears, apple crumbles, apple fritters, etc.
It also makes a perfect Autumn/Winter treat served with giant caramel macarons “tatin-style” (see p113 of the book.) You can also use this sauce for filling salted caramel macarons. To make the sauce more manageable for macarons, make a ganache using 80g white cooking chocolate (I love using Valhrona) and melt together in a saucepan with 30g of whipping cream. Add half of the caramel sauce (save the rest for further pleasure) and leave to cool for a good couple of hours until an easy consistency to pipe on to your macarons.
Salted Caramel Sauce
Preparation Time: 5 minutes
Cooking Time: 20 minutes
160g sugar
200g single cream, warmed
120g salted butter
1. Put the sugar with a few drops of water into a small saucepan. Using a wooden spoon, stir it now and again over a medium heat until a golden syrupy caramel forms. This should take about 10 minutes maximum.
2. Turn down the heat and add the warm cream gradually, stirring constantly.
3. Mix in the butter, still over the gentle heat and keep stirring until thickened.
Pour the caramel into a serving jug at room temperature and set aside until needed.
The caramel can last up to 3 weeks if stored in a sterilised sealed jar in the fridge – so why not make double? 😉
UPDATE !
Passionfruit Caramel: Sieve out the seeds of a passion fruit and stir the juice in with the sugar in step 1 instead of the water.
Coffee Caramel: Add a tablespoon of granulated coffee to the caramel for a perfumed coffee caramel.
Orange Caramel: Add the zest of an orange for extra zing – or why not limes, kumquats, meyer lemon…
this is truly as you said: a life saver on any plain dessert! and much to the delight of conventional taste!
Has been my pleasurable downfall all of 2011, glad to see others succumbIng, off to the fridge now…..
My husband loves caramel I have to try the recipe. It is so trendy now caramel and salt….yummy, Looks so delicious. Thanks for sharing:)
This caramel sauce would be wonderful drizzled on brownies, too, the possibilities are endless. I have to make this, soon.
Oh Jill this looks so very fantastic. I don’t know if it requires anything other then a spoon to eat it with. However a nice bowl of vanilla bean ice cream would be pretty tasty.
It is days like today, when I see this recipe, that I know why I am always all over your blog.
Yum! Actually promised my husband to make salted caramel hot chocolate, so I would definitely use your recipe!
See it’s stuff like this that makes me stalk you. So fabulous! I plan on covering everything in caramel sauce. Look out world.
Jill…I don’t need to drizzle this over anything. I just need a spoon!!! Caramel sauce is a basic necessity for me. And this looks exceptional! A must have in my fridge at all times! : )
I will have to be strong and stay as far away from this as I can. Caramel is my chocolate. It beckons to me if it is anywhere near. This looks amazing.
Jill-with all these delicious sauces, I am going to think my desserts are naked without them! This is a great one to have on hand for the holidays-yum!
I go gaga for salted caramel. When I read the passionfruit caramel option I just about drooled on the keyboard. Oh. My. Goodness. What a delicious post!
Oh wow. Major craving alarm! I love salted caramel, and I actually have never had it in sauce form. I think I’d douse almost anything in this 🙂
GREAT IDEA!! Love how simple and quick the recipe is!
So delicious. I wish I could have a bite. Thanks for sharing the recipe with us!
Oh yum! One of my favourite dessert sauces, so versatile with anything from apples to ice-cream. Love the long shelf life too, although it wouldn’t last a week in my fridge!
Looking at the photo, I can imagine how tasty that sauce was..Thanks for sharing dear…