Tag: mixed nuts

Home-made herb & spice bar nuts

Home-made herb & spice bar nuts in a bowl | H is for Home

If we fancy a pre-dinner drink (or perhaps drinks if we’re ushering in the weekend), we love to accompany them with tasty snacks of some kind. This recipe for herb & spice bar nuts, which caught our eye online, looked absolutely perfect. We’ve just given it a go… and it turned out to be a very good decision. Great rewards for relatively little effort.

Nuts mixed in an aluminium bowl Melted butter, sugar, salt, chopped fresh rosemary and cayenne pepper

I used 100 grams each of hazelnuts, cashews, walnut halves, pecans and whole almonds. However, you can use whatever nuts you like or have in the store cupboard; peanuts, brazils and macadamias. If 500 grams is too large a portion for your needs, it’s really easy to just halve the recipe.

Home-made herb & spice bar nuts

They were gorgeous – and so moreish! In fact, they’re a great snack to include on a party buffet table; they really suit being eaten with beer, wine and whisky.

Click here or on the image below to save the recipe to Pinterest

Home-made herb & spice bar nuts recipe | H is for Home

Home-made herb & spice bar nuts
Serves 6
Ingredients
  1. 500g/18oz unsalted mixed nuts (e.g. peeled peanuts, cashews, brazils, hazelnuts, walnuts, pecans or whole unpeeled almonds)
  2. 2tbsp coarsely chopped fresh rosemary (from two 8cm/3-inch sprigs)
  3. ½ tsp cayenne pepper
  4. 2tsp Muscovado sugar
  5. 2tsp salt
  6. 1tbsp unsalted butter, meltedBar nuts ingredients ingredients
Add ingredients to shopping list
If you don’t have Buy Me a Pie! app installed you’ll see the list with ingredients right after downloading it
Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350ºF/Gas mark 4
  2. Toss the nuts in a large bowl to combine and spread them out on a baking sheet
  3. Toast them in the oven until they become light golden-brown, about 10 minutes
  4. In a large bowl, combine the rosemary, cayenne, muscovado sugar, salt and melted butter.
  5. Thoroughly toss the toasted nuts in the spiced butter and serve warm
Print
Adapted from Nigella Bites
Adapted from Nigella Bites
H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/

Cakes & Bakes: Mixed nut toffee brittle

Home-made mixed nut toffee brittle

We’ve had a whirlwind week; we had visitors come to stay and are currently spending a couple of nights at Justin’s mum’s. I realised that the weekly Cakes & Bakes post would be due and I hadn’t yet made anything.

Sugar syrup using golden caster sugar | H is for Home

Seeing as Justin’s mum (aka Granny Glittens) regularly says how much she likes my peanut brittle, I took the hint and made some mixed nut toffee brittle.

Cooked brittle cooling on a tray | H is for Home

Rather than plain peanut, I found a bag of ‘Best’ mixed nuts in the supermarket and bulked them up with a bag of cashews that I already had in the store cupboard. In the mix were pecans, hazelnuts, Brazils and Carmel and Marcona almonds.

Apparently the latter are:

The ‘Queen of Almonds,’… imported from Spain. They are shorter, rounder, softer, and sweeter than the California variety.

Broken up brittle in a large glass jar | H is for Home

If you’re using large nuts like Brazils or whole walnuts, it’s a good idea to chop them into 3 or so pieces to make them a better size for gobbling up!

Click here to save my recipe to Pinterest

Home-made mixed nut toffee brittle recipe
Mixed nut toffee brittle
Prep Time
5 min
Cook Time
10 min
Total Time
15 min
Prep Time
5 min
Cook Time
10 min
Total Time
15 min
Ingredients
  1. 500g/17½oz caster sugar
  2. 3tbs water
  3. 50g/2oz butter
  4. 250g/9oz roasted mixed nuts
  5. 2tsp bicarbonate of sodaHome-made mixed nut toffee brittle ingredients
Add ingredients to shopping list
If you don’t have Buy Me a Pie! app installed you’ll see the list with ingredients right after downloading it
Instructions
  1. Line a large, shallow baking tray with greaseproof/parchment paper. You can grease the tray lightly to make the paper stick to it
  2. Pour the sugar into a large, heavy-bottomed sauce or frying pan
  3. Turn the stove on to a medium-low heat, add the water and stir for about 30 seconds until the sugar has turned to a thick syrup
  4. Stop stirring!
  5. Bring to the boil (still without stirring) allowing it to simmer for 5 minutes or, if you're using a candy thermometer, bring up to the hard crack stage of 146-154°C/295-309°F. You'll see the consistency go from grainy to smooth and shiny.
  6. As soon as you get to this point, turn off the heat and stir in the butter quickly
  7. Add the nuts and stir those in quickly
  8. Add the bicarbonate of soda, again, stirring in quickly
  9. Pour the boiling mixture carefully on to the prepared baking tray and allow it to cool for about half an hour
  10. Break it up into pieces using a toffee hammer or the butt end of a kitchen knife
  11. Store in an airtight container lined with greaseproof paper
Print
H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/