Home › Fondant Candies › Fondant Candies
Fondant Candies
FONDANT is the foundation of most bonbons and chocolate creams. It is made of sugar cooked with water or other liquid to 238 degrees F. The best results are secured by the use of a thermometer, but if one is not at hand, test the syrup by dipping a spoon into cold water, then into the syrup, and again into the water. Remove candy from spoon with fingers; if it forms a soft ball that will just keep its shape, the syrup is cooked sufficiently. Saucepan should be removed from fire while tests are being made, that candy may not overcook. Another test is to dip spoon into syrup, then lift about twelve inches above saucepan, letting syrup drop from spoon. If it spins a thread at least eight inches long, it has reached the correct stage for fondant, fudge, or ornamental frosting. The addition of an acid to the boiling sugar causes part of the sugar to change to glucose, giving a finer grain to the candy than can be secured without it. Cream of tartar, acetic acid, or vinegar may be used. Corn syrup or glucose takes the place of acid.
When cooked, the syrup is poured on a marble slab, a large platter, or an agate tray which has been moistened by being wiped over with a damp piece of cheesecloth. The candy should stand until it feels cool when tested with the back of the hand. It is then worked with a broad metal spatula, in a sweeping motion forward and backward until candy becomes sugary. If it is not possible to procure a wide steel spatula, a wooden butter paddle may be used. The mixture should be continually pushed away and brought back, turning the spatula over with each motion. Candy should be kept all together in a mass while being worked. When it becomes too solid to be moved easily with spatula, it may be kneaded with the hands, as bread is kneaded, until it grows soft and creamy and remains in a compact ball. If it lumps and becomes very hard, it was boiled too long. If it remains too soft to handle, it was not boiled long enough. If too hard, the lumps can sometimes be reduced by persistent kneading, or the mixture can be returned to the saucepan with half a cup of hot water, and reboiled to 238 degrees F. If too soft, confectioners' sugar may be added to make it firm enough to handle, or water can be added, and it can be reboiled to 238 degrees F. When it has been worked sufficiently, fondant may be put away in a tightly covered jar, and kept in a cool place for an indefinite time. When used, color, flavor, nuts, and fruit may be added, as desired. With these, an almost endless variety of mints and bonbons can be produced.
This is a master method rather than a fixed formula, and the numbers it does give still hold. A candy thermometer removes almost all the guesswork the original had to work around.
- The hinge: cool before you work itFondant grain is decided by temperature at the moment agitation begins, not by how long you stir. Poured syrup should sit undisturbed until it is around 100-110F before the spatula touches it. Working it hot throws coarse crystals and gives a gritty, sandy texture; the usual remedy is to reboil the batch to 238F rather than to keep kneading.
- 238F, and what it meansThat is the soft-ball stage. Verify a digital or clip thermometer in boiling water first; at sea level it should read 212F, and subtract about 1F from your target for every 500 feet of elevation.
- Proportions, since none are givenOne workable batch is 2 lb (about 4 1/2 cups) granulated sugar to 1 cup water, with either 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar or 2 tablespoons corn syrup. The yield is roughly the weight of sugar used.
- The thread testThe eight-inch thread and the soft-ball test are two readings of the same stage and were meant as fallbacks. They are workable but imprecise; the thread test in particular is easy to misjudge on a humid day.
- Acid versus corn syrupBoth serve the same end, keeping a fraction of the sugar from forming large crystals. The acid inverts some of the sucrose during boiling; corn syrup instead supplies glucose ready-made, which makes it the more forgiving of the two because its effect does not depend on boiling time. Too much cream of tartar gives fondant that never firms.
- Wash down the panThe text does not mention it, but a single stray crystal on the pan wall will seed the whole batch. Brush the sides with a wet pastry brush during the boil, or cover the pan for the first two minutes so steam does the work, and do not stir once the syrup boils.
- Agate trayAgateware is speckled enamel over steel. A marble slab, a rimmed sheet pan, or a large heatproof platter all serve; the point is a cool surface with enough area for the syrup to spread thin.
- Ripening and storageFondant improves if it rests. Pack it into a jar, press a damp cloth or plastic against the surface, and leave it a day or two before use; the texture becomes noticeably smoother. It keeps for months in a cool place.
- Adding flavour and colourWork these in during the final kneading, not into the hot syrup, where heat drives off volatile flavourings. To use fondant as a dipping coat, warm it gently over hot water to no more than about 140F, thinning with a few drops of sugar syrup.
Fondant, from the French fondre, to melt, was a mainstay of the confectioner's trade by the late nineteenth century, and books of this sort answered a home demand for the boxed bonbons of the candy shop without the price. A great many of the soft-centred sweets in a candy store window began as this one paste: dipped chocolate creams, peppermint patties, coloured mints, stuffed dates, the soft interiors of fruit-flavoured bonbons. What made the domestic version practical was the household thermometer, which became more common in home kitchens in the early twentieth century and turned crystallization from a feel for the syrup into a number anyone could read. The older tests preserved here, the soft ball and the eight-inch thread, describe the same stage, and they survived in print for decades after the thermometer made them optional.