not popcorn, but POPCORN

I'm warning you, as I was warned by blog posts from 'Love Your Mother Earth' and 'Our Best Bites.'
(You can find the recipe on either link above.)
I didn't believe them, and you may not believe me-

This is ADDICTIVE.  One bite leads to - ten bites - leads to twelve cups.
Yes, over a period of days, 'I ate the whole thing!'  And-it-was-delicious.

The popcorn was at it's absolute peak of flavor just out of the oven and slightly cooled; however, it's flavor and texture were great days later.  The outside of the popcorn was sweet and crunchy, and the inside of the popcorn kernel was soft.

cooking brown sugar

ahh....this looks like I'm a trained barista mastering latte art...but I'm not

This is brown sugar beginning the conversion into delicious butterscotch caramels.  The recipe is from "Brittles, Barks, & Bonbons" by Charity Ferreria (page 77).

I cooked this mixture to 250 degrees F; the caramels cut beautifully.  For those of you who, like me, fear sugar/caramel, I encourage you to just jump in and melt some sugar.  I've experienced more successes than failures.  Once the fear of melting sugar passes, there are endless possibilities.

Spun sugar, here I come!

very early boiling stage:

a few minutes later:

they cut SO much easier at room temperature rather than immediately out of the refrigerator:

beautiful ... just beautiful

wrapped and ready to share (wax paper squares are so much easier to wrap than parchment paper)

unwrap and enjoy!

photograph and consume:

almost a vanilla wafer - but not

Do you see the sunlight, flowing through the cookie?

My uncle gave me the rolling pin years ago; he said it belonged to my grandmother, who was born in 1891.

A Betty Crocker recipe from the 1940's - "Caramel Refrigerator Cookies." (Original recipe from “Betty Crocker’s Cooky Book”.) I found the recipe here, from Laura in Idaho.

As I mixed the dough, the ingredients reminded me of chocolate chip cookies without the chocolate chips. But the flavor of the baked cookies is not that of chocolate chip cookies sans chocolate chips.

Sliced 1/8 inch thick, they are crunchy; sliced 1/4 inch thick, they are chewy. I have decided to describe them as caramelized brown sugar. There's something about the cookies that makes you want 'just one more.'

Simple...a connection with the past...