The time of year has come, where candy canes will infiltrate our homes, our stores, our schools, and even our dreams. There’s a good chance you’ve got a strong opinion on candy canes. Are you the kind of person who likes peppermint or those funky fruity flavors? What about shapes? Do are you in the traditional cane shape camp or do you prefer sticks? How about size? Those mini candy canes are just kind of weird.
Regardless of your standing on the current state of candy canes, you should probably take a few moments to appreciate how these little sugary holiday goods are made.
First up, we have the obligatory “How It’s Made” showing the mass production of the candy canes. This is probably how the majority of the candy canes you see were created.
Like any other candy though, there is a rich history of hand making them. Watch as the sugar is heated, poured, slapped, stretched, twisted, and pulled into the shape you’ll recognize.
Its almost hypnotizing watching how the sugar, which is extremely hot, just slowly melts on the surface as they work on it. It would be tempting to touch it, but as they remind us in many of these videos, that would be painful.
These can totally be made at home. People don’t often consider candy canes as a home made treat, but it is doable.
Even in other languages, the process is fairly understandable. It is certainly still fun to watch, even if you don’t understand them.
Neiman’s supplies a very informative narration during their video. There are some good tips mixed in here as well, that you could apply to smaller batches at home. You probably won’t have that fancy forced-air fire system though.
Here is another fantastic tutorial on how to make your own at home. The results look fantastic, but are very visibly not store-bought.
To wrap up our exploration of candy canes, lets look at an exceptional example; a massive candy cane made for an elephant named Shirley.
ADVERTISEMENT
