About a month ago, I visited Wendy Boys at her home for a column I write. She’s a pastry chef and the owner of Cocolico by Wendy Boys—a chocolate and dessert sauces company—but she just had a baby. I felt really lucky that she still agreed to teach me how to make a holiday snack, and I learned how to make Wendy’s sweet and salty pretzel mix that day. After sampling the mix, which was OMIGOD delicious, I knew I wanted to recreate it at home. I bought a bag of twist pretzels and mixed nuts at the grocery store, but decided to also try making a caramel sauce from scratch. So this recipe is an adaptation of both Martha Stewart’s caramel sauce and Wendy Boys’s holiday pretzel and nut mix.
Ingredients
- 1 (454 gram) bag of mini twist pretzels
- 2 cups roasted, salted nut mix
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- 2 tablespoons water
- ¼ cup heavy cream
- 1½ teaspoons unsalted butter
- 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 cup brown sugar
- ¾ teaspoons chili flakes
- ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 2 teaspoons cinnamon
Start by preheating your oven to 325F. Take out two large baking trays, and spread the pretzels onto one tray and the nuts onto the other.
In a small saucepan, combine the granulated sugar and water. Don’t stir it and place the pot over medium heat. After a few minutes, the mixture will start to bubble and turn an amber colour. Start shaking the pot so that the mixture swirls, but still don’t use a spoon yet.
When the sugar turns a rich brown colour, remove the pot from heat and stir in the cream before adding the butter and vanilla, and stirring until combined. This is your caramel sauce!
Now you’re going to add a few spices to give your caramel sauce a bit of kick and pizazz! Add the brown sugar chili flakes and spices. Stiff continuously over low heat until all of the ingredients are melted in and the mixture feels silky and smooth. It will take about five more minutes before the caramel is at the consistency you’re looking for, which is quite runny.
Pour the caramel sauce evenly over both the pretzels and nuts. Working quickly with a spatula or wooden spoon, toss the pretzels and nuts in the sauce so that most of the pieces are coated in caramel. Not to worry if it starts getting incredibly sticky but not everything is coated. You’ll be giving the mix a toss a few times.
Place the trays into the oven and set a timer for five minutes.
When five minutes are up, remove the trays from the oven and toss the nuts and pretzels again, trying to coat every piece. Again, when the mixture starts to harden up, put the trays back into the oven, and set the timer for another five minutes.
After another five minutes are up, remove the trays from the oven, and give both mixtures one last toss.
Place the trays back into the oven for the final five minutes. While the trays are in the oven, take out a clean pair of dishwashing gloves. These will protect your hands for the heat and stickiness of the pretzels and nuts at the end.
When you remove the trays from the oven, put your gloves on and start breaking apart the pretzels and nuts with your hands. This is especially important for the pretzels because once the caramel hardens up, you won’t be able to tear apart pretzels without breaking them into tiny pieces. The nuts are quite resilient so you can help yourself by using a spoon. Wendy said that if the caramel hardens up too quickly, simply pop the trays back into the oven to soften up.
I kept tossing the mixtures with my hands until they cooled down, which took about 10 minutes. When they’re cool, place them in festive tins or mason jars, and it will keep fresh for a good two weeks. If you have gluten-free people in your family, keep the mixtures separate as the nuts are gluten-free, but the pretzels are not. Thanks Wendy for teaching me how to make this wonderful snack! Happy holidays!
