a divinity candy recipe or DIVINITY GETS THE BEST OF ME

Unanswered Prayers for Divinity Go Awry as UnHoly Mess appears mysteriously in kitchen

The Confession:

It has happened again. It happens every year without fail, or should I say, with failure. Once more I have thrown caution to the winds and tried to make Divinity.

My Christmas memories are greatly centered on the foods my Mother and Grandmother would prepare. Grandmother would always make the most wonderful Divinity candy at holiday time. I was very fond of Divinity but I must admit I never connected the reason we only had it at Christmas with the reason you don’t make it all year round, which is that the stuff is very difficult to make. Grandma was the proud producer of white seafoam Divinity at our house, hers was heavily scented with vanilla, resplendent with chopped pecans, sometimes cherries and walnuts, sometimes tinted pink or green, but always crunchy, creamy when eaten and looking like snow drifts. One of my best Christmas memories is Grandma’s Divinity.

In those days it seemed to me the Grandma went into the kitchen clicked her ruby slippers three times, waved her magic spoon and presto change-o: we had Divinity.

For many years I tried to replecate Grandmother's Divinity but the secret of its success eluded me. In the end after years of failure and endless blobs of rubbery paste; I retired my candy thermometer to the back of a drawer and forgot it was there.

It all began again at the doctor's office when I picked up a Good Housekeeping and flipped to a Divinity recipe; The magazine guaranteed the recipe was: "fool proof" "so easy" "can't fail" "even a 10 year old child can make this"....must I go on? it is pure torture....

Every year I swear off and say I will not try to make Divinity, yet, every year while grocery shopping, I find myself mystically transported to the baking aisle where I somehow miraculously end up with bags of sugar, corn syrup, pecans, vanilla and cream of tartar that levitate into my cart. Magically, I suddenly arrive at the checkout with the makings for Divinity, and yet I dare not whisper the name.

"Oh", says the checkout woman, "Someone's going to make Christmas candy".

My face blazes a warm red color. "Well, no", is my reply, " I am just going to make Seven minute Icing for cupcakes"; I sputter the lie through my teeth.

"Oh, yeah" the saleswoman continues, "seven minute icing doesn't use pecans - looks like some makins' for Divinity you got there", she persists.

"No, no, sorry, not me, I don't make that stuff; too sweet and gooey - ruins the teeth - I am on Atkins this year." I continue to lie.

"Okay, well ya know it has to be a sunny day, no humidity and you need a candy thermometer", she advises.

"Yes, well I can never seem to get it right anyway so I gave up trying years ago", my extensive capacity for lying surprises even me.

"Yeah, well some people can never make it, but it's all in the timing, watch out for the humidity too", she says, "I make it every year so just be careful with the thermometer and pick a sunny day to make it and you should get it right".

"Thanks", I hiss, as I carry the bags out of the store and run home to check the barometer.

I have surreptitiously been watching the barometer for days waiting for a big drop in humidity and today is an all time low; so all covert operations are GO!

My spirits soar with hope as I gather together the ingredients; simple stuff nothing arcane: sugar, cream of tartar, water, corn syrup, dash of salt; whipped egg whites. What could be easier? Get out the trusty candy thermometer just to be sure. Oops it’s rusty, so I wash the rust off and dry the official measuring instrument. I continue trying to be quiet rifling through the gadget drawer so as not to arouse suspicion....

My husband is playing bridge on the computer. He does not notice all the preparations going on in the kitchen.....He is French and they don't make Divinity in France but they have instead the, no holds barred, Great Granddaddy of Divinity - a concoction so delectable, so scumptious and so hard to make it was once only reserved for Royalty but is now only reserved for those who can afford its price. To be a maker of this Certified French confection you have to specialize in it at Candy Making Culinary College, get your certificate, have your own shop and be regulated by the French Government in order to produce: Nougat. I am transported by daydreams of Nougat: the first and only time I had any real French Nougat was when my honey brought some back for me after a business trip to France; it cost (two years ago) $29 for 4 ounces of nougats. Nougat of the Gods is a rich formula of finely ground almonds, whipped egg whites, cooked and flavored with a whispy hint of lavender and bergamot waters, strewn intermittantly with plump Persian pistascios (rather like a Turkish Taffy but not gelatinous and much more like the whipped air of heaven for mortals only taste on Earth) then set sqaurely on the merest hint of a wafer on one side - so thin is this wafer you can see through it and it is barely detectible when you are munching the nougat.

I am daydreaming as I crack the eggs and sort the whites from the yellows. Deftly I combine the sugar, syrup, salt, and water to begin building the syrup, swirling with the wooden spoon on the stove....

After all, I reason, Divinity is just some sort of bastard Nougat. They are both made of egg whites whipped up with sugar and nuts and cooked.

Mmmmmm, I am thinking, perhaps I could start a new trend in Franco American cuisine and introduce Divinity to the French people- for those who cannot afford Nougat..... My daydreams persist as I see my husband and I (in the customary black dress uniform of the chic French woman) with rosy cheeks and French flag cockades on our chests; happily cutting the ribbon to open a chain of Divinity shops throughout France and then Europe

N-O-U-G-A-T, what am I thinking? I must be insane to try to make Divinity again.

Too soon I am involved whipping the egg whites and watching the syrup boil. My husband hearing the commotion in the kitchen comes in to inquire if I am making cookies. So, I decide to make him an accomplice and he is conscripted into whipping the egg whites whilst I give my attention to the syrup.

Oh no, the thermometer is too short for the pan so my fingers get steamed raw every time I try to measure the heat but I have entered the point of no return as the syrup boils furiously on the stove. Finally we have achieved "soft ball" stage, accurately and recorded on the steamy thermometer, and I pour half a cup of hot syrup into the whipped egg whites. My husband is enjoying the whipping so he is happy to stand with the mixer at attention until I reach "hard ball" stage.

This is the part that is tricky. I can never seem to achieve "hard ball" accurately. So this time I have the thermometer (which is too painful to use with that pot and the steam) and I have my trusty teacup of cold water for testing the "hard ball" stage. All the experts say you can drop some cooked syrup into a cup of cold water and a hard ball will form in the bottom of the cup...I have never achieved this fete; my hard balls are always mushy , yet I persist.

Ah HAH! the time has come I scoop up a bit of syrup on the end of the spoon and drop it into the teacup. Mmmm, not a hard ball but close, so I cook a bit longer, pretend to use the thermometer again, get a steam burn and decide to pour the syrup on to the egg whites.

Voila! My partner and I change places as I now whip the steaming mass of white fluff. I add vanilla and keep beating. There is a high glossy sheen to the candy. That gloss looks promising, I am thinking,as my gleeful spouse runs to get the camera to record the occasion for the French relatives and friends.

Happily I add the pecans and start the slow cooling process of beating the white froth with a wooden spoon. It says to test one spoonful. I do and it almost sets but I am in too much of a hurry to note this fact and I am worried the foam will set in the pot (reality is sort of a short coming of mine must I admit). Finally, the seething frothing mass seems to have cooled enough and I start to drop by spoonfuls on to buttered wax paper. Full of hope I try unsuccessfully the twirl the spoon so I get that topknot, the magazine recipe mentioned, on each blob.... horrors; my topknot melts into the blob...Okay, I think I will press a whole half pecan in each patty and pretend I intended for this to happen. I consider for about 10 seconds also pressing some chocolate chips into the shiny gummy blobs but decide not to temp fate more than I have done.

The blobs spread out like pancakes. I turn the ceiling fan on to "dry things out". Hubby is hopping around the kitchen getting photos of the glistening white puddles, which do look quite attractive (if you do not know they are disasters). I take courage in the comforting thought that neither he nor his relatives will know what Divinity is really supposed to look like and the photos will probably make the blobs look like manna from heaven.

My husband zaps me back into reality as he prods a melting patty, "when can we eat them"? he asks. "Oh, you have to wait until they dry", I say. "How long is that", he says beginning to smell a rat. "Oh, I am not sure", I say busying myself cleaning up the kitchen. "I will return", he says and goes off to upload the photos.

Three hours later and the puddles have not dried or set and are still soft marshmallow looking blobs without the powdered sugar coating. Hubby is trying to prod one with a spoon so he can get a taste. I scrape one from the wax paper, “it tastes really good”, I say reluctantly.

“But Chou Chou, what is wrong with thisssssss stuff?”, my love coos to me.

“Never mind”, I say truthfully,

(There is that point in all writing and drama where the express object of the subject of the written words is made: it is called the Denouement (da-new-mon). This is when the author has decided more or less to “sock it to” his reader and reveals the reason he or she wrote the tome in the first place and this is it for you, dear reader)

“I think it’s failed , so, let’s just put it in the freezer and hope for the best”, I say tearfully as I realize another Christmas Season will come and go and Divinity will not be on the menu once more this year. Oh, well, I rationalize: Some things are just better left to our imagination.