Candied Pecans

Have you ever purchased a kitchen gadget, on a whim, only to forget about it? C'mon, you must have a bone pile of those, somewhere?  One of my very first posts, when I started this blog, a year ago was about a "Nut Roaster" that I bought at Target.  I used this product, once, then put it in my "garage pantry" and it got buried and forgotten about.  Last month, my husband reorganized the garage which gave me more shelf space to organize my vast collection (I seriously need therapy) of baking sheets, pans and doo-dads that I've collected over the years.  I decided to read the recipe booklet and try this forgotten purchase once again...

This is the photo of the product from the "Back to Basics" website. It's, basically a non-stick pot, with a "scraper" and a handle. Pretty simple and clever design, right?

I keep large bags of pecans in my garage freezer. I love me some pecans!  These are 2 cups of pecans and 1 cup of sugar, and 1/2 tablespoon of cinnamon (optional)...

I added 1/4 cup water with 1 1/2 teaspoons of vanilla...

On medium-high heat, I start to turn the handle, which evenly turns the nuts and liquid.... between 5-10 minutes...

 

Now, the sugar mixture is getting nice a bubbly...and hot, so you don't want young kids to be, unsupervised, near this.

One the liquid is evaporated, and the handle is hard to turn- it's done! Turn off the heat...

With a wooden spatula, spread on parchment paper. The nuts are still hot, so I  had to wait a few minutes... overall, these were ready in less than 15 minutes. Like Ina Garten says, "how easy is that"?

Mercy!  Oh my!  These are addicting.  I made these for our friend from Georgia-- the same night that I made Ina Garten's Coconut Cake.  Larry was so pleased. I know that PEE-KANS are very popular in his neck of the woods.  I used these for something I will blog about I have more time.  I will say this-- this gadget isn't going into hiding anymore. It's pretty darn clever, and it cleans up very easily.  If you spot one, at Target, I think it's worth the $25.00 that I paid for it. I found that  Amazon has these for sale, too.  I plan to use almonds and to spice some up, with some cayenne.  

Now, for the winner of my giveaway-- I want to say thank you to each of the 41 people who left a comment on my One Year Blogoversary post!  I'm going to check out some of your favorite chefs, that I've never heard of before! Thank you for your kind words and your friendship-- and it's so nice to met many of you who commented for the first time.

Looking forward to my second year of food blogging,