Old-Fashioned Toffee Recipe

Old-fashioned toffee is a holiday favorite that recipe developer Kate Shungu says is "great for gift giving or holiday cookie trays." While this particular recipe has the usual hits (the toffee, the chocolate, and the nuts), Shungu also likes to add flaky sea salt to the top of her toffee.

Shungu says this trendy ingredient "gives it a modern twist and a punch of saltiness that perfectly complements the sweetness of the toffee." She notes that traditional recipes will typically include some salt in the candy itself, but says that here "the extra flaky salt on top brings this old fashioned recipe into the 21st century." She does say, though, that you can omit the flaky salt topping if you're not on board with the whole salted caramel trend and prefer your toffee the old-fashioned way.

The toffee is built on a base of nuts — Shungu uses pecans here, although she says that, for an alternative, "you can either use walnuts, almonds, or leave out the nuts altogether." The toffee itself is made of butter, sugar, salt, and vanilla, while the candy is topped with a layer of melted chocolate chips. For salting the top, it's best to use flaky sea salt such as maldon.

Go ahead and give your pecans a nice, rough chop. It's best you do this by hand, as a food processor would chop them too finely, which would significantly reduce the crunch factor. Once the nuts are chopped, line a flat pan with parchment paper, then sprinkle the nuts onto it in a rectangle about 9x12 inches in size.

Melt the butter on the stove top and add the sugar (plus a little salt). Set the burner on medium so the mixture doesn't heat up too quickly. Bring it to a boil and cook it until it reaches 285 F on a candy thermometer. This should take about 10 to 15 minutes.

Stir the mixture every so often as it cooks, but keep a close eye on that thermometer. As soon as it hits the proper temperature, stir in the vanilla and then turn off the burner.

Pour the candy mixture evenly over the pecans, then let it cool for 2 minutes. Next, sprinkle the chocolate chips over the candy, then allow it to melt for 2 to 3 minutes. Once it has softened up, spread the melty chocolate out over the toffee. As a last step, sprinkle the chocolate with the maldon salt. Let the toffee cool for 2 hours at room temperature or for 1 hour in the refrigerator, then break it into pieces before eating. The candy can be stored either at room temperature or in the refrigerator, but either way, it's best to keep it in an airtight container.