Nougat

Rachel Allen is 1 of my favourite chefs and I really enjoy watching all her popular series. Her charismatic and natural style makes her interesting to watch. I like her way of cooking, as it’s practical, simple yet delicious. I fell in love with this dish called Nougat while watching her Home Cooking series recently and thought why not give it a shot? And here’s the right week to indulge in yummy treats as I have mentioned in my earlier post ;).

Nougat is a term used to describe variety of traditional goodies made with sugar and roasted nuts. There are two types of nougat i.e. white and brown. White nougat is made with beaten egg whites and is soft and brown nougat is made with caramelized sugar and has a crunchy consistency.

Sugar is heated at different temperature before mixing it with the egg white & nuts. I felt this dish is something similar to Chikki , a traditional Indian sweet made from jaggery syrup and nuts. Here goes the recipe for Nougat

Ingredients

Caster sugar – 450g

Powdered glucose – 225g

Water – 150ml

Egg whites – 2

Rice paper – 8sheets, measuring 6x15cm

Almonds, pistachio nuts roughly chopped and toasted – 150g

Candy thermometer

Method

• Add the sugar, powdered glucose and water in a pan on a medium heat and bring it to boil. Keep stirring till the time sugar dissolves. Then reduce to the heat to low and simmer without stirring. Keep on low heat until the mixture reaches 121deg Celsius (Dip a sugar thermometer/candy thermometer to measure this). This might take 10-15min.
• Next add the egg whites in a large mixing bowl. Once the sugar temperature reaches 110deg Celsius begin whisking the egg whites to stiff peaks in an electric food mixer on a low setting. Once the syrup reaches 121deg, pour a quarter of it on a slow, steady stream into the egg white and continue to whisk.
• Immediately return the remaining syrup to heat and keep it on heat without stirring till it reaches 149deg Celsius. All the while continue whisking the egg whites on a slow speed. Egg white is used as a whipping agent here.
• Once the syrup reaches the required temperature, pour carefully in the same way as u did earlier into the whisking egg whites. Continue to whisk the egg whites for about 30minutes. By then the mixture would be stiff and halved in the volume. Now the nougat mixture is ready. If the mixture sticks to the sides of the bowl, you can scrap down the sides of the bowl with a spatula dipped in boiling water.
• Meanwhile, place half the rice paper at the bottom of a cake tin measuring 25x15cm (you can use any rectangle shallow cake tin).
• Stir the nuts into fully whisked nougat mixture and mix well. Pour this mixture into the prepared tin and spread quickly using a spatula dipped in boiling water. Place the remaining sheets of the rice paper on the top to cover and press down to stick.
• Allow it to cool and then place in the refrigerator overnight or 4-6hrs until set.
• Then remove the block of nougat from the baking tin and cut into fingers. This has to be stored in fridge, wrapped individually in parchment paper or cling film.

We are enjoying these delicious candies after every meal :d. Here’s the first look of Nougat after it is set –

Now that I have given the details about Nougat and share it with you all, I think its time for me to have a bar of Nougat; wont you join me ;)?