Saffron Honey Marshamallows

I consider myself a fairly proficient cook and baker, but a novice when it comes to candy-making. To be fair, most of my history with attempting to make candy occurred in my childhood without the aid of a candy thermometer. I had to get by with being told to cook until the "soft ball stage" or "hard ball stage" and spent my time dropping bits of fudge or hard candy into glasses of water then scrutinizing its consistency. More often than not, this resulted in sweet goo which was edible, but nothing like what it was supposed to be in texture.

My first truly successful foray into the world of candy-making was recounted on this blog when I made the Times recipe for microwave saffron Turkish delight. In fact, I have made it twice and it turned out beautifully each time. In between this attempt at making marshmallows and that old success with Turkish delight, I made Alton Brown's homemade marshmallows recipe and it turned out fantastic. That recipe utilizes what many feel is the devil's breakfast drink of choice, corn syrup, but that didn't really put me off. As someone who cooks most of her own food (down to even making my own bread), I don't think a little corn syrup in the occasional homemade marshmallow recipe is going to be a significant detriment to my health.

Perhaps emboldened by that success, and being an enormous fan of the flavor of saffron and honey, I wanted to try the Times recipe for saffron honey marshmallows. It didn't hurt that the recipe showed up on my Facebook feed around Easter and the prospect of making cute, yellow sweets (though not shaped like chicks - I don't have that type of cookie cutter) seemed like a great idea at the time.

I followed the recipe to the letter except for one tiny point. I didn't use a 1/2 tsp. of crumbled saffron threads because it's too expensive to squander in that way. I used 1/4 tsp. Other than that, I did exactly as I was told and this was the result after I sprinkled colored sugar on it:

One commenter on the Times recipe page said hers turned out "gooey," but attributed it to her lack of skill. I'm not going to put the blame on me. The recipe is too wet. Far, far too wet. It was so wet that I decided to cut them up and separate them out several times in an attempt to get them to dry a little:

My first attempt was to gently take the soft, squishy blobs and put them in a container with no lid and more sugar. All that did was have moisture pooling at the bottom of the container much as it did the baking dish I'd poured them into. I allowed them to sit like that for two days and it did little to dry them. If I wanted to eat one, I had to put it in a bowl and eat it with a spoon because it was too wet and soft to handle.

After the container approach failed, I took them out and spread them on a baking rack so there was more air under them. I allowed them to be completely exposed to open air for three days to no avail. They were less sopping, and a few of them had crispy, sugary corners where they'd dried out, but, on the whole, they were still far too gooey and soft to handle.

In the end, I put them back in the container with no lid and just ate them slowly. Any hopes that they would dry out enough to be given to others to enjoy (which was my initial plan) was dashed. They sat on top of my refrigerator for two weeks and never did get dry, but they did start to eventually taste stale and I threw the uneaten ones away.

It is unfortunate that this is such a terrible recipe because the flavor was quite nice and the texture of the marshmallows fluffy and soft. The recipe adds in a total of 1 1/4 cups of water and I think that could be dramatically reduced to get a better result. I'm unlikely to try this recipe again, but if I were to give it another shot, I'd reduce the total water down to no more than 3/4 of a cup (1/2 cup of cold on the gelatin and 1/4 cup cooked with the sugar instead of 3/4 cup and a 1/2 cup).

Someone in comments who said she/he was a professional confectioner said that the issue is that honey is hygroscopic and that other liquid should be reduced so I'm not alone in thinking there is an issue with how wet it was. I don't know if there was an error in the original recipe or if the creator of the recipe did something different, but I wouldn't use this recipe as is. That commenter recommended Thomas Keller's French Laundry marshmallow recipe, which looks a lot like Alton Brown's. I'd recommend either of those over this. Though you won't get the honey and saffron flavor, you also won't get a pile of wet marshmallows.

Microwave Saffron Turkish Delight

One of my friends went to Istanbul earlier this year and brought me back a box of varied sweets. Each cube was a firm jelly either lightly dusted with a white powder or studded with nuts. They were dark in color for the most part, favoring deep reds and greens, and quite tasty. My favorite was the one that tasted like cherry, though I enjoyed them all. There was a cloudy white one that seemed to be coconut as well as a few that were obviously pistachio and walnut; the nuts peppering the edges were a dead giveaway. There were also some that were difficult to reach conclusions about the flavors as they clearly were not common in America, but I can say that I'm certain not one of those delights were saffron-flavored.

Saffron isn't a flavor one usually associates with sweets and my main experience with it is sparingly using those expensive threads with paella that I make for my husband. I have a tiny bottle at present that was given to me as a souvenir of his father's and sister's visit to relatives in Spain a few years ago. When it runs out, I know I'll have to reluctantly pay more per ounce for this spice than I'd pay for gold.

Because of the high price of saffron, and the intensity of the flavor, I was stunned that the New York Times recipe for microwave saffron Turkish delight included a teaspoon of it. That seemed like an enormous quantity by any standard, but then I guess the Times food editors and writers make more money than my family does. As I scanned the recipe, I decided to reduce the amount of saffron and increase the amount of lemon to suit my tastes. I also substituted vanilla extract for vanilla bean because I didn't have any on hand and they are also very expensive. This was a substitution I regretted, and that I'm pretty sure lowered the quality of flavor of the final outcome, but I was already investing enough by using my precious saffron and I didn't want to splash out for a vanilla bean on a recipe that may flop. I've tried to make candy very few times in my life and have rarely experienced success.

You can follow the link above to the Times version of the recipe with instructions (which I followed as they appear), but my ingredients list was as follows:

• 1 1/4 cups cornstarch (plus more as needed for dusting)
• 3 cups sugar
• 1/4 cup corn syrup
• 1/3 teaspoons saffron threads
• 3 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar

Though this is a microwave recipe, it is still labor intensive. The use of a microwave over a conventional stove-top cooking method is likely meant to reduce the chances that the candy will burn, not speed up the process. You need to stop at frequent intervals and stir. I used a glass bowl much bigger than required and a silicon spatula. Heed the warning on the instructions to handle the bowl with oven mitts as it will get hot over the long cooking process. The larger bowl makes stirring the thick molten liquid much less dangerous.

Since I rarely make candy and all of my previous attempts were pretty disastrous, I erred on the side of over-cooking rather than under-cooking. I followed the instruction to smear a bit of the mixture on the side of a cold plate, but I found that that it never quite solidified into a soft solid as I expected. I know the plate was cold enough because I kept it in the freezer between tests. After cooking for one more cycle than the maximum amount of time (24 minutes), I concluded that I'd better stop.

When I spread the gel-like mixture into my well-greased pan, it started to solidify pretty rapidly and became impossible to spread evenly. I ended up with an uneven topography of yellow goo. After cooling and freezing, cutting was an adventure as it was extremely tough to get the semi-frozen mixture to pull apart. I was very concerned that the candy was going to end up like ancient gummy bears texture-wise and would pull out my fillings when chewing.

The picture on the New York Times page for the recipe shows bright yellow candy with brilliant threads of red saffron topped by a snowy white dusting. Mine looked like this:

The instructions tell you to store the candy in a a shallow container filled with a mixture of half powdered sugar and half cornstarch. This is the wise way to store them and leaves you with the snowy-looking specimens above. They are not photogenic, but they also aren't sticky. If you attempt to package or display your candy as the Times photo does, it'll stick terribly to the sides of the plastic bag that you artfully place it into.

While the reality isn't pretty, it is extremely tasty. The textural issues that were concerning me did not come to fruition. After the candy had warmed to room temperature, it turned into a pliable, but manageable jelly candy. The texture is, for lack of a better word, delightful. The flavor, despite my reducing the saffron, had plenty of that spice present. If anything, I'd recommend reducing the saffron down to an even smaller amount (1/4 teaspoon, perhaps) and keeping the increased lemon juice amount. The lemon flavor isn't particularly potent and I think that it keeps the candy from being too sweet. The flavors definitely come together to produce something akin to honey without the cloying sweetness or stickiness.

This is a fantastic candy recipe and I would definitely make it again. I'd consider also changing it up with other flavors (such as orange or even anise). However, I wouldn't make it often because it's an enormous amount of work. I think it'd make an excellent holiday recipe or as a special treat for someone who loves jelly candies or Turkish delight.