Panocha mani
Roasted peanuts set in muscovado boiled to the hard crack, poured thin and snapped when cold.
Vegetarian, but not vegan — contains dairy (butter).
Ingredients
- 400 g raw peanuts, skins on
- 300 g dark muscovado sugar
- 100 ml water
- 0.5 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon butter
Method
- BOILED TO THE HARD CRACK, 150C, which is far past where the balikucha on this site stops. That one is pulled at 125C and stays chewy; this one is poured at 150C and sets brittle. The two sweets are the same two ingredients and the thermometer is the entire difference.
- Roast the peanuts first: 170C for 15 minutes, shaken once, until the skins darken and loosen. Raw peanuts in hot sugar do not cook -- they just get hot.
- Keep them WARM until they go in. Cold nuts dropped into 150C sugar chill it on contact and it starts to set before you can spread it.
- Sugar, water and salt in a heavy pan. Stir until dissolved, then STOP STIRRING and let it boil undisturbed.
- Boil to 150C on a thermometer, or until a drop into cold water goes instantly hard and snaps between the fingers rather than bending. 12 to 15 minutes.
- Muscovado is dark and you cannot judge this by colour, which is why the water test matters. Judged by eye it is usually pulled too early.
- Butter in, then the warm peanuts, stirred fast for 15 seconds only.
- Pour it onto an oiled tray and spread it THIN with an oiled spatula, working quickly. Thick, it is impossible to bite; 5 mm is right.
- Leave it to set completely, about 30 minutes, then snap it into irregular pieces by hand.
- Airtight the moment it is cold. In humid air it goes sticky within a couple of hours.
Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.
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