Marshmallow Monday: Coffeemallows

As a Seattliete, I couldn’t go too much longer without incorporating one of my favorite “foods” into Marshmallow Monday: coffee!

These are so good. And I mean, GOOD. You may want to use decaf coffee in yours so you can have them for dessert and not be up until 3AM. Not that I would discourage you from having one for breakfast. Sometimes you need dessert for breakfast.

Enjoy!
M

Coffeemallows
Prep time: 35 min | Ready in: 6 hours, 35 min

Ingredients:

• Cooking spray
• 3 packages unflavored gelatin (vegetarian substitutions)
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• Brewed coffee, chilled:
  • If you have an espresso machine, use 8, 1-ounce espresso shots
    
  • No espresso machine? No biggie—just make 1 cup of quadruple strength coffee (i.e. use the same amount of grounds you normally would for 4 cups, but only send one cup of water through them instead of the usual 4).

Cooking tools:

• A candy thermometer
• Tin foil
• 9×13-inch cake or jelly roll pan

Directions:

1. Line the inside of the pan with tin foil, then coat well with cooking spray.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine a 1/2 of a cup of the cold coffee with the packets of gelatin and allow to sit until gelatin forms, about 15 minutes.
3. In a medium saucepan on medium heat, combine the sugar and the remaining 1/2 cup of coffee, then stir until sugar has dissolved—about 3 to 5 minutes. Increase heat to bring mixture to a low boil, and continue to boil until the temperature reaches 240 degrees F on a candy thermometer. Remove from heat.
4. Slowly pour sugar mixture into the bowl with the gelatin, simultaneously using a mixer on low. Gradually increase speed to high and continue whipping until the mix is thick, about 10 to 15 minutes—imagine the consistency of pourable taffy. NOTE: A stand-up mixer is ideal for this type of recipe, but rest assured, you can do this with an electric hand mixer. I did it—it just requires a little coordination and comfortable shoes.
5. Pour the mixture into the pan, smoothing the surface with a spatula. (Spray spatula with cooking spray as needed to keep it from sticking.) Let the marshmallow sit for about 6 hours, uncovered, until completely set.
6. Cover a surface larger than the marshmallow slab with powdered sugar and flip the cake pan over so that marshmallow lands on the dusted surface. You have to do it quickly, and it’s going to kick up some “dust,” so just prepare yourself. (It’s all part of the fun, right?)
7. Cut marshmallows in whatever shapes you’d like. (It helps to continually coat the knife or cookie cutters with powdered sugar to keep them from sticking. A pizza wheel is great if you’re just cutting into squares or rectangles.)
8. Dust all sides of marshmallow pieces with powdered sugar.

Voila!

Want to get extra fancy? I created some Starbucks-inspired Coffeemallows for HelloGiggles.com. Go check ’em out —> Get the Recipes