Pecan Brittle

Having grown up in the south, everyone always talked about peanut brittle and how great it was. But I just couldn’t get behind it. I may have grown up in Peanut Town (if you know you know lol) but they were always the lesser nut in my opinion so why would I want it to be the star in my holiday treat?

Because of this I had pretty much written off brittle as an item I would just never enjoy. That is until I had a pecan version! That’s when it clicked and I finally understood the hype.

This Pecan Brittle comes together fairly quickly and calls for ingredients you likely already have on hand. Making it the perfect last minute treat to bring to a holiday party or give as a gift!

What you’ll need:
– 1 1/4 cup pecans, roughly chopped (136g)
– 1 teaspoon cinnamon
– 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
– 1/2 teaspoon salt
– 1/4 cup water
– 1 cup sugar (225g)
– 6 Tablespoons butter
– 2 teaspoons vanilla (optional)

What you’ll do:
– Preheat your oven to 350F. Line a baking sheet with parchment and spread out your pecans. Bake for 5 – 10 minutes or until lightly toasted and fragrant. Sprinkle with cinnamon.
– Combine the baking soda and salt in a small dish and set aside.
– Combine water, sugar, and butter in a medium pan and melt over medium high heat, stirring continuously with a rubber spatula. Once everything is fully melted, bring to a simmer and STOP stirring.
– This next step will vary in time based on the temperature of your stove and the size of your pot, but you’ll want the sugar mixture to simmer until it turns an amber color. For me this takes anywhere from 5 – 8 minutes. Every 30 seconds to a minute, swirl the mixture over the burner but do not stir.
– Once the sugar mixture begins to change color (close to the color of honey), swirl the pan to ensure that the entire mixture has changed colors. Remove from heat.
– Quickly stir in cinnamon coated pecans (and vanilla if using). Once the pecans are coated, quickly stir in the baking soda and salt.
– This will immediately begin to set so quickly poor out the mixture over the parchment lined pan that you used to cook the pecans. Using your spatula, spread the brittle out as thinly as you can.
– Allow the brittle to fully cool (about 30 minutes) and then break into pieces and ENJOY!

A few notes:
– You can absolutely use peanuts or any other nut for this recipe, pecans are just my personal fave!
– I made this once without toasting the pecans and I definitely recommend not skipping this step.
– The cinnamon really makes this recipe for me and adds a level of flavor that I definitely think is necessary to balance out the heavy sweetness.
– I read other recipes that did say to stop cooking the brittle at 300F. I tried temping it the most recent time I made this and it had not yet changed colors at 300F and was much closer to the 350F range.
– When adding in everything after the sugar has cooked, you want to be as quick as possible and have everything ready to go.