You've Never Tasted Peanut Brittle This Good

Dad was a multi-talented individual who became best known for his many years as a pastor.  But that didn’t start until he was forty-six years old.  Before that he had been a farm boy, a factory worker, owned a gas delivery business with a brother-in-law, and finally worked for quite a few years at the Lima Lumber Company—working his way up from deliveryman, to sales and management.  After he was called to be a pastor in Wayne County, Ohio, he needed to keep on working because the church was small and could not provide full support.  So Dad briefly tried his hand at being a building contractor, before moving again to sales in a local lumber company, and then establishing a building supply business for the Walter Jones Construction Company of Wooster.  He was a success at this, but after a few years he was called into a full-time, full-paid pastorate at the large Hartville Mennonite Church.

Probably due to his growing up on a large farm, Dad was good at many things, including carpentry, fencing, field work, taking care of animals, painting, repairing things, and just in general, making things better than what he found them.  He was a man with a plan, and never were his hands or mind idle.  I’m thankful that he pushed us to work with him and for him, and we learned a lot.

One thing Dad did not do—he did not cook.  Can’t really fault him for this though, because our home was a traditional one, and Mom loved cooking for the family.  There was one small hitch in the family plan however.  Mom and Dad had six boys, and no girls to help in the kitchen.  So we learned that it’s okay for boys to spend time helping out in the kitchen, cooking some basic things, setting the table, doing the dishes, and mopping up our messes.   These are skills that some of us have continued, and our wives appreciate it.   In Dad’s defense though, I  suppose in a pinch he could have fried eggs or cooked hotdogs if he needed to, but he never needed to.

Dad did love spending time in the kitchen though—eating Mom’s good cooking and conversing with the family while we ate.  He taught us how to say a blessing for the food, and we took turns doing that.  And he taught us table manners, like passing the food, no arguing, saying please and thank you when we wanted more of something, and definitely no farting while at the table.  These are important things to learn.

* * * * *

Last Saturday, while transporting Jacob and his family to southern Ohio, I brought some molasses crinkle cookies along to share with them while traveling.  He was a little surprised to learn that I had baked the cookies.  Amish families are very traditional with respect to a division of duties and expectations between the men and women.  It may be that some men would enjoy cooking, but as far as I know, this is left to the women and girls.  There may be exceptions, I don’t know.

In our conversation, as we motored down the road, I mentioned to Jacob that I had seen a couple butchered hogs hanging from tripods in his backyard a few weeks ago.  “Yes,” he said, “we wanted to get them butchered and make sausage before we moved.”

That made me wonder about something else, so I asked him.

“Do you use the hog’s small intestine as casings for the sausage?”

“Yes we do.”

So now I had another question.

“How do you clean out the intestines to get them ready for stuffing with sausage.”

His reply surprised me. “I don’t know.  The women do that.  I think they have to wash them out and scrape them.”

So wouldn’t you like to be an Amish woman?  They do a lot of chicken butchering too.  In fact, we’ve had Jacob’s family butcher some for us in years past, and it’s always the women doing it while the men are working out in the fields.  The women help with the milking too.  Never a moment to relax, it seems.  The sturdy Amish women are skilled at many things, including cooking, raising babies, and doing a lot of work that we might think only men would do.

So what in the world does all this have to do with peanut brittle?  Well, I’ve chosen to get there in a roundabout way.  I didn’t grow up with a Dad who did things in the kitchen, so as a young married man, I supposed that I would not be doing much in the kitchen either.  Those things I had learned from my mom—I thought my wife would be doing them now.  And she’s done a good job over the years, but I’ve learned that I enjoy spending time in the kitchen too.  Cooking can be fun, especially when it comes to the sweet stuff.  Now to the peanut brittle.

I never really cared much for peanut brittle—that is until an older co-worker introduced me to a recipe handed down to him long ago.  He said he enjoyed making it at deer camp each year, and brought a batch to share at our workplace too.  It was amazing!  Crispy and delicious, it melts in your mouth, with nothing sticking to your teeth.  Only 5 ingredients.  Peanuts, sugar, karo syrup, salt, and soda.  The secret though, according to him, is using a cast-iron skillet and a wooden spoon.

He shared the recipe with me, and for the last thirty-five years (until I, too, have become an older man) I’ve been producing quite a few batches each Christmas season.  It’s not difficult.  It takes no “stretching” of the brittle, and less than 15 minutes from start to finish.

List of ingredients for each batch:

1 C white sugar

1 C karo syrup

1-½ C Raw peanuts.  (Raw blanched peanuts.  Available in bulk food stores or on the internet.)

¾ tsp salt

1-½ tsp soda

10” cast iron skillet

Wooden spoon.

Before you start:

1)  Measure out the soda, and keep it on standby.

2) Have a greased cookie sheet or pizza pan nearby on a hot pad.

3)  Make sure an empty kitchen sink is available or you will have scorched brittle in your skillet.

Put all ingredients except soda into the skillet and turn the stove on high (for gas) or med-high (for electric.)

Stir occasionally as the ingredients begin heating up.   Stir continuously after it comes to a good boil.

This batch is about half-way there.  Boiling nicely.  Keep stirring.

The brittle is finished and ready for the soda when you notice these things:

The color is turning amber, the peanuts begin splitting, and you can smell the roasting peanuts. (On my gas stove, it takes exactly twelve minutes.)

Turn off the heat, add the soda, and stir rapidly, but not for long.  The brittle will foam up nicely.  Immediately, before it scorches, dump it onto the cookie sheet and let it spread out and settle down on its own.

Put the skillet in the sink and fill it with hot water.  The heat from the skillet and the hot water will very rapidly melt off the remaining brittle.  Use a scrubber to easily finish cleaning it up, and you are ready for the next batch.

Let the brittle cool down.  Turn the whole “cake” upside down on the cookie sheet, and crack it with the handle of a table knife.

Enjoy.

And that’s all from Kidron, Ohio, on this chilly, breezy evening.  The homely men and lovely women are busy getting ready for Christmas.  The children are staring at the gifts under the tree, and guessing what may be in them.   Have a blessed weekend, and a wonderful Christmas Season with family.