Belgian Candi Syrup

[electronjunkie]

During my mash for my dubbel today I used this link to make dark candi syrup
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/20-lb-sugar-jar-yeast-nutrient-114837/

It turned out pretty good.

But after I stopped the cooking process I wound up with a solid brick of sugar and a little liquid.

I heated this up and about 10 minutes later I wound up with a layer of hot sugar between the sugar brick layer and the pot. I broke this layer with my spoon and kablam. It started spewing everywhere as the water solution in the top layer met super heated sugar from below. Scared the sh*t outta me.

Next time I will try stirring the water in slow so that the syrup does not crystalize to the pot. This crystalizing is a mess and could screw you up if you are not careful.

 

[boostsr20]

Hot sugar is like lava.

 

[ReverseApacheMaster]

I've made it twice with very different results each time. If you end up with very little water in it, as it cools it hardens very fast and you are basically stuck with it wherever it is (unless you reheat it with more liquid). If you add too much water, it will stay syrupy. I have some in my fridge I made last week that is still syrupy but I'm sure over time it will start to crystallize.

When you try to make it into a solid form, you have to dump it out of the pot immediately after taking it off the heat or it will just stick in your pot.

 

[electronjunkie]

I've made it twice with very different results each time. If you end up with very little water in it, as it cools it hardens very fast and you are basically stuck with it wherever it is (unless you reheat it with more liquid). If you add too much water, it will stay syrupy. I have some in my fridge I made last week that is still syrupy but I'm sure over time it will start to crystallize.

When you try to make it into a solid form, you have to dump it out of the pot immediately after taking it off the heat or it will just stick in your pot.

Yeah next time I'll just dump it in the pot and time it so it is during or near the end of the boil.

 

[Beezer94]

If you heat it up too high after the final water addition you go from:
soft ball @ 235-240F
firm ball @ 245-250F
hard ball @ 250-265F
soft crack @ 270-290F
hard crack @ 300-310F

So when you heat it up on the final stage if your thermometer is even a "little off" then you could end up with a whole different thing like you found. (the cheap candy thermometer I initially used was 30F+ off and it was supposed to be for making candy!)

http://www.exploratorium.edu/cooking/candy/sugar-stages.html