Apple Peel “Taffy”

After making 15 apple pies and a couple batches of cinnamon apple chips I had roughly 6 lbs off apple peel in my fridge. There was no way I could just toss them without feeling bad (“use everything” has been drilled into since childhood), so I searched out recipes. I was going to make apple jelly from them using the natural pectin that is supposed to be in apple peels. I say supposed to be as apparently I did something wrong and got no pectin. I had gotten to the point were it should have been jelling and it wasn’t happening. I used rubbing alcohol and tested for pectin, to find I didn’t have any. Well I had already put a lot of boiling time into the project, so I decided to see if I could just turn it into candy. This turned out to be an interesting candy with all natural sugars and colours (it is only apple peels and water) that was fun to make.

Ingredients:
Apple peels
Enough water to cover peels

Directions:
1. Put the apple peels and water into a large pot and bring to a simmer. Stir for a while until you can smell the apples, and taste it in the “juice”.

2. Drain the juice from the peels and run through a jelly bag.

3. Place the juice in a clean, heavy bottomed pot and boil until the temperature reaches 270F (soft crack stage). Note: this will take several hours and really depends on how dilute your juice is.
4. Pour the hot candy onto parchment paper or a silicone mat. Let the candy cool until it you are able to handle it, then butter your hands and pull the candy – folding, not twisting it.

5. When it is becoming to cool to pull, form it into a rope and let cool a little more.
6. Cut the rope into small pieces.

Reviews:
The candy was tasty, and even though I scorched the syrup a little it was still and interesting candy. The peels made the candy a nice dark red color that is great to look at.