Almond Rocca

Every Christmas, my mom buys almond rocca. As kids we used to joke around saying it looked like cat turds. Gross I know. It is one of my favorite candies, and the only time I ever got it was during the Christmas holiday.

When I was taking my culinary class in high school, we made almond rocca. It was good, but there were no almonds due to some students being allergic to them. So we made rocca I guess you would say :) Anyways, I have taken this simple chocolate-less, almond-less recipe and have added those two key ingredients to it. Now if you are allergic to almonds, or chocolate, just don't add it to the recipe when you make it. Here it is:


Almond Rocca

1 pound butter (NOT MARGARINE)
1 pound brown sugar
1 C. finely choped almonds*
2 C. semi-sweet chocolate chips* (or dark chocolate chips)
1 piece of wax paper the size of your cookie sheet

Directions

1. Prepare a cookie sheet with Crisco (or any shortening you have). Make sure you cover the ENTIRE sheet, sides included as well as corners. Place in the oven at 200 degrees to warm up.
2. Melt the butter in a medium sized saucepan on high heat. If you have an electric stove, use setting 9. Stir until completely melted.
3. Add all of the brown sugar and stir CONTINUALLY, or else it will burn.
4. Cook to hard crack stage. Test it by placing small amounts of the hot melted sugar and butter in a bowl of cold water. It has reached to the hard crack stage when the sugar breaks when bitten. If it sticks, keep cooking and repeat the process often.
5. Remove the cookie sheet from the oven.
6. Mix almonds into the sugar mixture. Carefully pour the hot sugar mixture into the middle of the cookie sheet. DO NOT SCRAPE THE BOTTOM OF THE SAUCEPAN! And burnt sugar on the bottom of the pan will ruin the candy.
7. Let it cool completely on a counter top. Do not put in the fridge. It will not set properly.

Chocolate
Make sure the almond rocca is completely cooled. This should be about an hour and a half to two hours.

1. Break the almond rocca into small pieces.
2. In a double boiler, add water to the bottom, and the chocolate chips in the top.
3. Place wax paper to your cookie sheet.
4. stir chocolate until melted.
5. One by one, dip the almond rocca into the chocolate, and place onto cookie sheet.
6. When all pieces are covered, place cookie sheet in freezer for 5 minutes.
7. Enjoy your homemade almond rocca!


Typing up this recipe makes me want to go make some :)
Instead of spending gobs of money on almond rocca during the holiday season, instead use this recipe to make the delightful treat.

Feel free to send me recipes to try or perfect. I will add them to my blog so be careful if you don't want me to unleash the secrets of your great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandmother's chunky corn bread. Check back often to see what else I'm cookin' up!