Caramel Corn: Recipe

Good morning, Kitchies!!  It's been an insanely busy morning, but I need to take a breather, so I thought I'd throw down a post.  I'm pretty sore from derby practice last night and it's making the day that much harder to get through. 

But good, sweet, not-good-for-you food always makes things better, right?  You know I am!  I was going to save this recipe for next week, but most of the comments said they were interested so I bumped up that post to today.  You're welcome.

I was craving caramel corn around New Years and I finally remembered to sit down and find a recipe this last weekend.  I started out looking for a salted caramel sauce recipe (because that's my new cooking obsession) and I stumbled across this awesome caramel corn recipe on my new favorite recipe blog: Recipe Girl.  I had flagged another recipe, but this one just called to me.

Caramel Corn
1/2 cup (1 stick) salted butter
1 cup light brown sugar
1/4 cup light corn syrup
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
12 cups popped popcorn

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with foil and spray with nonstick spray.

Melt butter in a 1 gallon pot over medium-high heat. Add brown sugar and corn syrup. Stir to combine. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low and let simmer undisturbed for 4 minutes. Stir,then continue to cook for an additional 4 to 6 minutes, stirring every 30 seconds, until the mixture is a deep golden color. Turn off the heat and whisk in salt, baking soda and vanilla. Set the whisk aside and stir in the popcorn. Scoop up the syrup from the bottom and over the top. Keep stirring and scooping the syrup over the popcorn until it is evenly covered and there is no syrup left on the bottom of the pan.

Spread the mixture onto the prepared cookie sheet and bake for 15 to 20 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes, until the caramel corn has turned a deep amber color. Remove the caramel corn from the oven and spoon it onto a waxed paper-lined surface to cool. When completely cooled, store caramel corn in a covered container- it should stay fresh for up to a week.

NOTES:  *You can use air-popped popcorn for this recipe or stovetop too. Here's an easy stove-top method to follow. Microwave popcorn will work as well, but it's not recommended as being the best choice.

My boys *devoured* the remaining stove-top popped popcorn...luckily they were already in bed by the time the caramel corn came out of the oven.  It killed me to work in the kitchen while this was baking.  It smelled soooooo good!

Now, my caramel corn didn't come out near as coated as Recipe Girl's did, but I'm okay with that because I think *that* much coating would be overkill.  And remember I said I was looking for a salted caramel sauce recipe?  This recipe kinda kills that craving because it's a bit salty, but not too much so.  It's just salty enough to enhance the sweet.  Soooo good! 

I have half a gallon baggie full of this and now all I want to do is run home, park my butt on the couch and throw on some trash TV and eat the rest!!!  Somebody asked about calorie content on this, and while I don't know what the count would be, I don't imagine this would be considered a "diet" food.  LOL  Not when your ingredients are sugar, corn syrup and starch. 

Either way, you need to make some of this.  NEED!