Episode 2 Sweets Made Simple

I'm Kitty Hope.

And I'm Mark Greenwood.

And although we've been married for ever...

..our first love is sweets.

Oh, I'm going to have another one.

Over the last ten years, we've built a business

devoted to rediscovering the best of British confectionery.

-Whether we're at home...

-Oooh!

..or at work, we're always on the lookout for new and exciting treats.

Do you like it, or hate it? I bet you hate it. I love it!

And we never miss a chance to try them out on the people we love.

-No.

-SHE CHUCKLES

But now, we're going to show you how to make our favourite confections

right there in your own home.

With sweets, the possibilities are endless.

And it doesn't have to be complicated.

Learn a few simple techniques and you're on your way.

Making sweets is the perfect way to spoil yourself, family and friends.

And it's something anyone can do.

This is Sweets Made Simple.

Mr G and I love remembering the sweets of our childhood,

but we're also passionate about

inventing new and exciting confections.

So in this show, we're travelling through time,

celebrating the sweets we loved in our youth,

and creating up-to-the-minute treats

with some rather un-sweet ingredients.

I love bacon!

We'll been making our own take on the classics, the Walnut Whip...

They are gorgeous.

..and the sherbet lemon dipper.

As well as letting you in on the secrets of two new inventions -

maple bacon lollies and tequila chillies dipped in chocolate.

Wow, that is a taste bomb and a half.

But first, a sweet that harks back to the very roots of confectionery.

Needing only a few simple ingredients, toffee is something

that's been made in kitchens all over the world for centuries.

And we're going to show you how to make it

using the traditional handmade method.

This is our recipe for pulled butter toffee.

If you ever thought that making sweets was difficult,

I'm here to persuade you otherwise

with our amazing recipe for pulled butter toffee.

Start by popping 225 grams of granulated sugar

and 75mls of water into a heavy bottomed pan.

And plonk in a quarter of a teaspoon of cream of tartar.

The cream of tartar will stop the sugar from crystallising

and give the toffee a really golden glow.

50 grams of unsalted butter, straight in the pan.

-No need to use a bowl. Less washing-up.

-Spot-on.

I'm very good at that. And straight on the heat.

We're going to let the sugar and the butter melt together.

I know how naughty you are. Please don't fiddle with it.

Don't prod it around.

Just leave it alone until the butter and sugar get to know each other.

Pop the thermometer in there. My trusty thermometer.

And we're going to bring that up to 137 degrees centigrade.

Sugar is quite a sensitive little beast.

Just that one degree difference below or above

can make all the difference between a soft toffee or a hard toffee.

This thermometer is my best friend in the kitchen.

-I thought I was your best friend?

-Not today.

-Oh...

If you don't have a sugar thermometer,

there are other ways of measuring the temperature of your sugar,

but I beg you to go to the shops and buy one tomorrow.

You won't regret it.

Once the toffee has reached 137 degrees centigrade,

pour the mixture onto a greased baking tray.

Luscious, golden toffee.

Still bubbling away.

But that is gorgeous.

The toffee is still very, very hot,

so we need to oil up a pair of rubber gloves.

And now the magic begins.

Start folding in the corners of the toffee into the centre.

It's a bit like kneading bread at this point.

You can see already it's starting to go really quite golden and silky.

This is where you need to draft in a friend.

Slowly.

Pull the toffee firmly at one end while pulling

and twisting from the other.

As it cools, you start to pull it.

-Twist it over.

-You can twist it.

You can see that it starts to get shinier.

It's like a unicorn's ringlet.

But it's not a toffee tug-of-war.

It can be a toffee tug-of-war!

As we're pulling it, it's cooling down.

It's becoming firmer, it's becoming shinier.

That is absolutely beautiful. Look at that.

I think that's the last twist for me.

As the toffee starts to become harder to work,

place it on the kitchen counter and even out the shape.

And you end up with something

that just looks like a golden skipping rope.

-Do you want to chop it up?

-I certainly do.

Using kitchen scissors, snip into short lengths.

You can cut it in any length you want, really.

We do it about 25mm.

Looking mighty fine there, Mr G, I must say.

I don't think there can be anything more satisfying or simpler

than this beautiful pulled butter toffee.

A bag of this in your pocket, a stroll along the beach...

Preferably with your best friend.

Life doesn't get much better.

Sometimes a traditional toffee is all that you want,

but let's gallop into the present with a surprising flavour combo.

Miss H and I love to mix old techniques with modern tastes,

which is how we came up with our next, slightly odd, recipe.

Hold on to your hats!

These are our maple, pecan and - ooh! - bacon lollies.

This next recipe, it sounds a bit strange, but stay with me.

First, two rashers of smoked streaky bacon.

You see, I've got three here. The third is the cook's perk.

Pop the bacon under the grill until it's crispy and golden.

Next up, half a dozen pecans.

Just going to give them a light toast,

just to release the nut oil and lovely flavour.

While pecans are toasting, two to three minutes on a medium heat,

take a piece of taking parchment

and mark out four circles about 8cms across.

Pecans are now done, so I am just going to take them off the heat.

And grab the bacon.

That is exactly how you want it - nice and crispy. That's ready.

Oh! So, salty and smoky.

I love bacon!

Bacon is so good.

Pecans out.

Roughly chopped, about the same sort of size as the bacon.

Mix that together...

You beauty.

Now for the lolly...

For that, we need to make a caramel.

Place 150 grams of caster sugar into a heavy bottomed pan

with 75mls of cold water.

That can go on the heat.

Add a drop of oil to the parchment paper.

Just to stop your lollies from sticking.

You want to use groundnut oil that won't impart any flavour.

Now, for the crucial ingredient - the maple syrup.

Two tablespoons.

This is real maple syrup, not maple-flavoured syrup,

and it's a little bit more expensive,

but it's really worth using because it gives it such an intense flavour.

Did you know that it takes 40 litres of maple tree sap

to make one litre of maple syrup?

And two tablespoons of golden syrup.

Pop your thermometer into the pan.

We're looking for a final temperature

of 150 degrees centigrade.

The temperature will race up quite quickly to 100 degrees

and then start to slow down

and gradually climb up to your required temperature.

Just leave it alone and let it do its thing.

Place neat mounds of the bacon and pecans

into each circle on the parchment.

Try and get them in the centre of the circle.

Doesn't matter if they run out to the edge.

Have a bowl of cold water standing by.

OK, so that's reached the temperature.

As soon as the caramel reaches 150 degrees centigrade,

dunk it in the water to stop it cooking.

That's cooled down a bit now.

Just a little drop on there,

just to set those gorgeous bits of bacon and pecans together.

Four lolly sticks.

Just pop that into the middle of the lolly.

You just need to get a grip on the toffee.

Seal the sticks with a little more caramel.

Be very careful,

because the toffee's still very hot at this stage.

You don't want to burn yourself and certainly, don't try it.

That's it.

Just need to leave them for about half an hour till they set,

then they're ready to eat.

Once you've finished your lollies

and you've got the clearing up to deal with,

the toffee that's left in the saucepan, to clean it,

don't bother trying to scrub it out,

just fill it up with water, back on the hob,

low boil and it'll clean itself, it'll all drop back into the pan.

They look great, Mr G.

That certainly is a very modern lolly.

Wow.

Oh, that is good.

But although very new fangled,

the lolly's roots go back to the treats of the past.

Yes, in fact the word "lollipop" originated in the 1780s.

Lolly is an old word for mouth,

into which the sweet on a stick would be popped.

Sweet shops of the past have been a great inspiration to us.

There can't be many people who don't have

a delightful memory of a sweet shop.

I love the sound of sweets tumbling into the metal scales.

And I love that feeling of having a coin in my hand

and wondering how far I could make it go.

Which is why I'm taking you, Mr G, to Newcastle,

to visit a very important sweet shop from my past.

I was an art student there in the 1980s

and I fell in love with my local sweet shop.

I used it as an inspiration for my work as a graphic designer

and my warm memories of it really are the foundations

of the business Mr G and I run today.

And while we're there, we're going to try out our latest invention -

those maple bacon lollies.

-I love these.

-I know, you do love them!

-I so love these.

-I don't know what those lovely Geordies

are going to make of them, though.

I've got such good memories of Newcastle.

I haven't been there for 30 years, I think.

I'm so excited! I'm so excited!

Over the last few years,

Newcastle has undergone a dramatic transformation.

My God, it's changed so much. It's changed so much!

But there is one corner of it that I really hope has stayed the same -

Clough's sweet shop.

Come on! Come on!

So excited! So excited!

BELL JINGLES

-It hasn't changed at all. It hasn't changed at all.

-Wow.

-30 years since I've been in here.

-30 years?

Oh, well, I don't think you'll find

we've changed an awful lot in 30 years.

-You haven't.

-Fantastic.

It's exactly how I remember it!

There's been a sweet shop on this site for over a century

and Alan Clough's family took over the business in 1934.

I love this shop so much. This shop changed my life.

I take it you like it?

Do you know, I loved it 30 years ago and I love it even more now.

It's so brilliant that it hasn't changed, though.

Why change it if it works?

Customers who come here would criticise

if we tried to make any big changes.

It was me mam and dad's life, being here.

-She worked here until she was 95.

-Incredible.

I bought everything,

from kola cubes to my favourite rhubarb and custards here,

and it was Alan's mum and dad, Mr and Mrs Clough,

who sold them to me and every other resident of Heaton.

-She was amazing, your mum.

-She was.

We were also extremely busy 30 years ago.

Well, me mam never sat down, really.

Even the chair the children used to see the sweets is the same.

I remember this chair, here.

We get grandads who used to be in here as children

and they used to stand on that chair.

One chap was telling me

that seven generations of his family have bought their sweets here.

And it's lovely to hear those tales.

You know, people will say, "Oh, those sweets always remind me

"of me dad, cos he always had some of them in his pocket."

Fantastic.

How many jars have you got in the store?

-We sell about 300 different kinds of sweets.

-300!

Pineapple chunks.

My favourite childhood sweet - chocolate Brazils. They're posh.

Special occasion, chocolate Brazils. Christmas, usually.

-Have wine gums got real wine in them?

-No!

-Have you got a gin one for me?

-A gin? I have, yes.

-Oh, my God.

-Does it taste like gin?

-I can't remember.

I want it to taste like gin.

Black Jacks make your tongue go black. And Fruit Salads...

It's great to be surrounded by these old favourites.

But can we convince the people of Heaton

to try something a little more unusual?

What, like our maple, bacon and pecan lollies?

Would you mind if your lovely customers had a taste

-and let me know what they think?

-Wow, look at that.

-I'm not going to tell you what they are yet.

-If you hang onto that, Ted.

-Thank you.

-Alan, there's your lolly.

I want you to guess what's in the lolly.

What do you think's inside the lolly?

-What do you think's in there?

-What's in there, Ted?

Shall we have a lick?

-What does it taste like?

-Pecan.

-Correct!

-Pecan's correct.

And maple.

What do you think, Alan?

Well, I've certainly never had a bacon lollipop before,

or sold one. I'm very surprised.

-It's great, though, isn't it?

-Yes.

Did you like it?

Yes, would make a lovely alternative to breakfast.

Brilliant!

Our lollies have gone down a storm.

But it's time to give these customers the sweets they really came in for.

20p.

-There you go.

-Thank you.

Satisfied customers.

It was topper to see all those traditional sweet at Clough's

and it's inspired me to make a home-made version of a real classic.

BELL JINGLES

Let's take a dip in the paddling pool of our past

with my homage to the sherbet dabs of our childhood -

a dark caramel lollipop is flavoured with lemon,

ready to be dipped into a paper bag of mouth puckeringly

sweet and sour sherbet.

This is my recipe for a sherbet dipper.

Let's start with the sherbet.

Carefully remove the skin from an un-waxed lemon

and put the peel in a medium oven.

On 150 degrees centigrade for about 20 minutes should do it.

Just long enough to be dried, but still fragrant.

While the lemon is doing its thing, let's make the lollies.

Put 150 grams of sugar into a pan

with one tablespoon of lovely liquid glucose

and the juice of half a lemon.

Find something fun to do while the syrup crawls its way

up to 150 degrees centigrade, but please don't leave the kitchen.

When it's reached the right temperature,

dunk the pan into cold water and spoon onto greased parchment paper.

Set in the lolly sticks and leave them to go hard.

Finish the sherbet by placing the cooled lemon peel

into a food processor with 100 grams of caster sugar

and our magic ingredient, one teaspoon of citric acid.

That's what creates the mouth puckering sourness

that contrasts so wonderfully with the sweet caramel lolly.

You can buy citric acid in larger supermarkets

or in good chemist shops.

For a truly nostalgic touch,

spoon the sherbet into bags

and lick while wondering if your old school friends

still have plasters holding their glasses together.

Sadly, we all have to grow up sometime

and if there's one sweet that says,

"put childish things away," it's our next classic recipe.

Walnut whips are one of the oldest British sweets still in production.

They were invented by Edinburgh confectioners Duncan's in 1910.

Manufacture moved to Yorkshire in the 1930s,

where one million whips a week have been produced ever since.

The original contained a light vanilla fondant

in the middle of a deep cone-shaped swirl of piped chocolate.

But it's gone through many changes over time.

The fillings have been flavoured with coffee, and even maple,

and mechanisation means

the chocolate is now moulded and not piped.

We want to get back to a handcrafted version,

but with a nod to its evolution

we're giving ours a soft coffee filling.

And of course, it wouldn't be the walnut whip

without its iconic nutty topping.

Some things you just can't change.

So, this is our personal tribute to the world-famous treat,

the walnut whip.

Now, I'm planning on our walnut whips

being the best they can possibly be, Mr G.

And that requires some super special ingredients.

We're taking a trip up to Piccadilly in London

to find some top-quality nuts.

-Nuts!

-Nuts! Nuts! Nuts!

It's believed that walnuts first came to Europe from Persia,

where they were the preserve of kings.

-Walnuts.

-Oh, look at those.

They look nice, don't they?

-Hello.

-Hi there.

-Hi, welcome.

I'm making some walnut whips.

We wanted to get the best walnuts that we could.

Walnuts are very nutritious.

They're exceptionally high in those good fats,

polyunsaturated omega-3s,

that are known to fend off heart disease and cancer.

-Can I try one?

-Yes, you can try.

Unfortunately, being high in those fats also makes them

especially liable to going rancid,

so buying them fresh is very important.

They are fresh.

We keep them in the factory with the shells, and then when we need

walnuts from our store, we break the shells and they send them to us.

-That's fantastic.

-It's really, really amazing.

-They taste so different, don't they?

-They do.

They're really...well, they're sort of creamy, aren't they?

-Yeah.

-And buttery, and there's no bitterness in there at all, is there?

Buying walnuts like these might be a little bit more expensive

than going to the supermarket, but what we're looking for is flavour.

I think if you're doing something special and it's a treat

and you want it to be the best of the best,

then just paying a little bit extra for something that special...

-And it's fresh.

-Amazing.

So, if I could have some, I'd be most grateful.

-Thank you very much.

-Bye.

-See you soon. Thank you, bye.

Armed with our walnuts, there's no time to waste.

It's back to the kitchen.

-Mr G and I love a walnut whip.

-We certainly do.

To start with we need 50 grams of milk chocolate,

which we're going to put through a simple process called tempering.

The reason we temper the chocolate is so that

when it pops out of the cup at the end,

it will be lovely and shiny and have a great snap to it.

Tempering encourages even-sized crystals to form in the cocoa butter.

The chocolate needs to reach 42 degrees centigrade

and then allowed to cool down to 31 degrees.

Using a fluted mould will give you a lovely shape to the whips.

Silicone ones like this are available from cook shops

and cake making suppliers.

That chocolate's going to cool down really quickly,

so you've got to work as fast as a ferret up a trouser leg

to make sure the moulds are filled before it cools.

I'm using plastic spoons,

as metal ones will cool the chocolate down a lot quicker.

While Mr G's doing that, I'm going to make the filling.

Two tablespoons of coffee essence.

Coffee essence is made with a mixture of coffee and chicory root,

which is quite bitter and is often used as a coffee substitute.

Splash in enough water to make 50mls of liquid.

If you're feeling a bit cheeky,

you could add a dash of brandy in right now.

-Oh, that is a grown-up recipe.

-It IS a grown-up recipe.

Splosh the coffee mixture into a pan

with half a tablespoon of soft light brown sugar

and bring it to a simmer.

Using a clear mould makes it really easy to see where the gaps are.

I don't want any of the filling to escape.

About 15 minutes in the fridge.

Now, plonk another 50 grams of milk chocolate into a small bowl.

Break it up, chop it with a knife, whatever you fancy,

but smallish bits.

-Nice?

-Mmm!

That coffee smells amazing. Oh, I love the smell of chicory.

It's so intense, isn't it? And deep, and rich.

Pour the coffee mixture over the chocolate.

And as the chocolate melts,

it gets gooier and stickier and more velvety.

That's going to make the most beautiful filling

for inside these walnut whips.

The filling needs to set in the fridge for an hour or so

before being added to the chocolate moulds.

-Can I have a taste before you do it?

-Yeah, go for it.

-Want some?

-No, I'll wait.

Oh, that's lovely.

It's got a bitterness to it

and you've got that punch of coffee coming through,

but that bitterness is really balanced out

by the soft light brown sugar.

That reminds me of when I was about ten and I had this amazing teacher.

And bizarrely, she had a cooker in the classroom,

and it was my job to make coffee essence coffee

for all the teachers at lunchtime.

-But I wasn't allowed to be head girl.

-So you were bossy then?

Yes, I've always been bossy.

Let the filling set before covering with more milk chocolate

and topping with a golden walnut.

-Could you pass me the walnuts?

-OK.

-Thank you.

Do you know, those walnuts

are the absolute crowning glory of those walnut whips.

Not only do they look amazing, but they're going to taste amazing.

I mean, it would be very easy to pop out

and buy a walnut whip at the garage.

But how satisfying to make these in your own home.

You could put maple in the ganache.

-You are off with your maple.

-Mmm.

-You love your maple, don't you?

So you can have a play. But that, for me, it's such a classic.

It is claimed one Walnut Whip is eaten every two seconds in the UK.

-I think we could probably beat that record.

-I think we can!

Oh, that is spectacular.

-Wow!

-They are gorgeous.

They are a real treat.

You look very happy.

THEY LAUGH

From classic to quirky, we couldn't resist ending this programme

with the hokey cokey of confections.

Chilli and chocolate may seem like rather odd bedfellows

in a show about sweets

but, in this recipe, they really are the most dazzling treats.

Hot and cool, sweet and sour, you are going to love them.

These are my Tequila Chillies.

This next treat is probably the most weird and fantastic recipe.

I have deseeded my chillies and I have had them soaking

in a couple of tablespoons of silver tequila for about 48 hours.

You can use gold tequila if you want.

I just, personally, prefer silver tequila.

Did you know that the majority of the heat in a chilli

is in that pithy bit inside?

Not the flesh of the chilli, but the actual pithy bit inside.

-I thought it was in the seeds?

-No.

Well, you are a mine of information today, darling.

-Are they finished yet?

-Not quite.

Now for the ganache filling.

For that I'm using 50 grams of white chocolate.

Stick it in a bowl, over a pan of warm water.

Don't let the bottom of the bowl touch the water and don't let

the water get in the chocolate because it will ruin your chocolate.

That is my top tip for today.

Let that melt and I'm going to add

one tablespoon of double cream.

That will take about two minutes.

Once the chocolate has melted, take the bowl off the heat.

This is where the zingy bit happens.

I'm going to zest about half a lime.

Then add the juice of half a lime and a tablespoon of tequila.

So that ganache is lovely and glossy,

I'm going to add 25 grams of butter.

I'm going to mix together that lovely butter with that sweet chocolate.

Now that smells like a very alcoholic ganache.

Allow the mixture to set in the fridge for a couple of hours

by which time it will be ready to fill the chillies.

Just do a little bit of quality control.

Whoo! Yee-ha! That's how good it is.

Fill each chilli with about a teaspoon of the ganache.

Now, I know you're looking at me from your sofa and you're thinking,

"You are truly weird",

because these look like I should be putting cheese into them.

Bear with me, because the combination of the lime,

the heat from the chilli,

the sweetness from the chocolate is absolutely stunning.

It does a complete hokey cokey with your taste buds.

I'm dipping the chillies in even more tempered white chocolate.

I've already tempered a bowl of white chocolate which means taking it

up to 42 degrees and then letting it cool to about 27/28 degrees.

That's the best temperature to start to use it.

It means it will be shiny and it will have a lovely snap when it's set.

Stick that chilli, without mercy...

..into the white chocolate.

It doesn't matter if you get a bit messy.

There are no rules with this one.

This is just good chocolaty fun.

As a finishing touch, sprinkle with a generous chuckle of sea salt.

We've got the sweetness, I've got the zing,

I've got the heat and I've got the salt.

I think that's about as near perfect as any treat could be.

That's it. Done!

I'm going to put them in the fridge.

I'm going to let them set and then I'm going to feed them

to Mr Greenwood.

Look, I've made you some of your favourite tequila chillies.

-They look absolutely fantastic.

-Don't they just?

Those are very beautiful.

Yum-yum.

I'm going for the whole one.

Oh!

Wow, that's a little taste bomb.

Wow, that is a taste bomb and a half.

I think these should be served on a hot date.

They would spice up your life and put a bit of pep in your step.

Next time, we'll be taking a look at sweets

with roots in the world of medicine.

From a wonderful throat soothing rose

and pistachio Turkish delight...

It is so pink and soft.

To the ancient remedy liquorice

used in our salt liquorice caramels.

And our iced gems made with Vitamin C packed rosehip syrup.

I'm going to have another one.