Salted caramel is a caramel candy seasoned with sea salt, popularized by French chef Pierre Hermé in the 1990s. The recent popularity of salted caramel has led to it being embodied in other confections such as ice cream, cakes, cocoa, and flavored coffees. Sea salts can vary in taste and color depending on how and where they were harvested. Caramelization can be traced back to the fourth century.
Salted caramel is simply a caramel candy seasoned with sea salt. It was popularized by French chef Pierre Hermé in the 1990s when he came up with a salted caramel macaron, which is an almond meringue cookie with a salted caramel filling. Soon after, American chefs began combining sea salt with a variety of desserts, including caramel and chocolate.
The recent popularity of salted caramel candies has led to the embodiment of other confections such as salted caramel ice cream, cakes, cocoa and flavored coffees. This popularity has also led to the confection appearing in more traditional and less specialized shops. These retail locations may include grocery and discount stores as well as coffee shops and ice cream parlors.
Caramel candies are made by carefully boiling sugar until it turns light brown, then adding heated cream, butter, and vanilla and stirring until blended. Once cooled, the mixture becomes pliable and chewy. Salted caramel is made by sprinkling fleur de sel, or another variety of sea salt, on top of the concoction as it cools. The popularity of gourmet sea salts has led to a variety of salts used for salted caramel confections, each imparting subtle differences in flavor.
Sea salts can vary in taste and color depending on how and where they were harvested. In general, sea salts are harvested by collecting salt water or a brine and allowing the water to evaporate, either naturally or through mechanical means. The resulting salt will vary in color and flavor depending on the mineral content of the water it was collected from. Gray sea salt, for example, gets its color from the clays that line salt ponds in the Brittany region on France’s Atlantic coast. Conversely, some Hawaiian sea salts contain minerals found in the red clays of that region and therefore have a distinctive red color.
Caramelization can be traced back to the fourth century when Indians discovered how to crystallize extracted sugar cane juice. As trade routes expanded, crystallized sugar production expanded beyond India into China and the Arab world. Sugar was not introduced to Europe until the Crusades of the 12th century. In the 17th century, colonial women added water to caramelized sugar and created a hard, long-lasting caramel-like candy. The term for caramel candy wasn’t coined until the 19th century, when milk and shortening were added to the recipe to create the modern gummy confection.
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