Within one of the interior rooms of Savannah’s E. Shaver, Bookseller store is a local section of all the city’s enchantments, including several cookbooks. One contained this super-simple recipe for pecan pralines. Previously, all the other versions I’d read included some candy-making fanciness which scared the bejesus out of me (I will never be someone who measures candy temperatures because burning sugar in any capacity is a well-documented bad idea for me.) However, this one gets all the cooking done in the microwave (so be sure if you try this you have a super-safe-for-the-microwave bowl because it gets hot, hot, hot).
The ingredients can be counted on one finger: one cup of sugar, one cup of packed brown sugar, ½ cup of water, 1 cup of roughly chopped pecans, and 2 Tbsp. margarine or butter. You put the sugars and water into a bowl and stir until sugar is dissolved, then microwave for 6 minutes, stirring once and then microwaving it for two more minutes. While it’s spinning and bubbling, chop up the butter into small pieces and freeze. Not sure why that’s important, but it is. When the sugar mixture is finished, it should be brown and dangerously hot. Carefully add the pecans and frozen butter pieces to this and stir until it thickens a bit. Drop by heaping tablespoon onto parchment or waxed paper in the shape of a praline. Let cool and you should have a close approximation of the classic southern candy, all without having to burn down the kitchen with boiling stovetop sugar.
The first few will be runny, but turn out shiny. The last few are thicker, but murkier. I will refine and see if I can find a happy medium, as this is a simple recipe worth a few shots, especially during the holiday season when typical Christmas cookies need a few sweet accents. Try one on a bowl of vanilla ice cream for an extra dose of decadence, or with your morning cup of tea when you need an extra sugar kick.
{Serious candy-makers will likely find all sorts of faults with this method, and they can probably spin perfectly-tempered sugar around me in pretty rings, but all I care about is ease and simplicity, and something that tastes and looks and feels remotely like the real deal – to that end, this recipe is genius.}
