Caramel Popcorn

I never imagined how fun it could be to make homemade caramel corn. I found this recipe, which uses a homemade caramel corn recipe. I figured I'd try both out and while they're great together, I thought the caramel corn deserves it's own post.

Ingredients

Around 16 cups of popped popcorn. (I used about 3/4 cups of unpopped popcorn and popped it myself.)

1 cup of brown sugar

1/4 cup corn syrup

1/2 cup butter

1/2 teaspoon of baking soda

1/2 to 1 teaspoons of vanilla extract

The way my mom taught me to pop popcorn is to pour enough vegetable oil in a pot to fill the bottom and turn up the heat. Toss one kernel into the pot and once it starts to boil, fill the bottom of the pot with kernels. Then, put the lid on the pot. Once the popcorn begins to pop, shake the pot around until 3 seconds goes by without anymore popping noises. 

Lay the popcorn out and continue the process until you have your 16 or so cups of popcorn.

Next, combine the brown sugar, corn syrup and butter in a microwave safe bowl. Put in the microwave on high for 1 minutes.

Take the bowl out and stir. Repeat the process until the mixture has been microwaved for a total of 5 minutes.

Add the baking soda and vanilla extract and stir until the mixture become foamy. Put the popcorn and caramel mixture into a brown paper bag (I just used one from the grocery store) and stir to mix the caramel around the popcorn. Fold the bag over and microwave for 1 minute. Take the bag out and shake it around it a bit. Microwave for another 30 seconds and shake again.

Finally, pour the popcorn out on parchment paper to cool. And voila! You have homemade caramel corn!

If you're feeling like an extra treat, add a few more ingredients to make s'more popcorn!