Spicy Hot Cinnamon Marshmallows
This project is an easy vote for the beautiful tasty alchemy of melted sugar. Using your grown up know-how, making homemade marshmallows is very do-able and a bit addictive!
Sugary hot cinnamon marshmallows make for a great smores flavor remix to bring your friends to their knees. These can be used anywhere marshmallows are demanded: on top of hot chocolate, in rice crispy treats and on top of hot apple cider.
Equipment needed for making the sugar beasties:
- stand mixer
- candy thermometer
- marshmallow resting container (7” x 11” baking pan yields marshmallows that are ¾” tall. An 8” x 8” baking pan will yield taller marshmallows)
- silicon coated parchment paper or waxed paper (marshamllows are supremely sticky before dusting!)
Ingredients:
- plain unflavored gelatin, 2 packets
- water, ¼ cup plus 2 Tbs
- ¼ tsp of salt
- ½ cup of tiny red hot cinnamon candies
- approx 1 cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup plus 2 Tbs corn syrup
- ¼ cup plus 2 Tbs water
- 3 Tbs of tiny red hot cinnamon candies (for dusting)
- rice flour or potato starch (for dusting)
Let’s get cooking!
Line your chosen baking pan with parchment paper or waxed paper. Cutting a slit up the corners of the paper on the diagonal helps it fit better in a rectangular container. Lightly oil the paper and set aside.
In a stand mixer bowl, outfitted with a wire whisk, pour ¼ cup plus 2 Tbs of water. Sprinkle the gelatin over to soften.
Grind up the ½ cup of tiny red hot cinnamon candies in a clean coffee grinder till the candies are pulverized to a dust. Add enough granulated sugar to the ground up candies so that the total volume equals 1 ½ cups.
Put this cinnamon candy sugar, the corn syrup, and the remaining ¼ cup plus 2 Tbs of water and salt in a heavy saucepan. Bring to a boil and cook until it reaches the soft-ball stage (234-240 F). It’s important to not go beyond this temperature range. Doing so will compromise the texture of your marshmallows.
With the mixer at low speed, pour all of the hot syrup slowly down the side of the bowl. Be careful as the mixture is very liquid and hot at this point and some may splash out of the bowl - use a splash guard if you have one. After one minute of mixing on low, increase the mixer speed to high and continue for 8 minutes, till the mixture is very fluffy and stiff. Pour mixture into your prepped. Allow the mixture to sit, uncovered at room temp for 10 to 12 hours. Do not refrigerate, as the refrigerator’s moisture will affect the mixture’s ability to set up properly.
After resting, the marshmallows will be set though rather sticky. All cut surfaces will benefit from a dusting of sugar-flour coating: grind up about 3 Tbs of red hot cinnamon candies to a fine powder and combine with an equal volume of rice flour or potato starch. Dust this mixture over the top surface of your set marshmallow slab.
Turn the marshmallow slab out onto a cutting board or counter, peel off the oiled paper and dust the revealed surface with more sugar/starch mixture. Slice with a thin-bladed oiled knife, oiled cookie or a pizza cutter. Dip all cut edges in the sugar/starch mixture and shake off the excess. Your homemade marshmallows will keep several weeks at room temp in an air-tight container.
Enjoy!
