Grandma Klein’s Chocolate Caramels

My grandma’s recipe for Chocolate Caramels is a family tradition. These homemade caramels are rich and buttery, perfectly chewy, and infused with chocolate – my favorite caramels in all the world!

The Best Chocolate Caramels Recipe

If I had to choose one Christmas treat with the most sentimental value attached to it, this would be it, my Grandma Klein’s Chocolate Caramels.

These caramels are perfection. They’re rich and buttery and chewy, like caramels are supposed to be. And they’re infused with chocolate. I don’t see any way this recipe could be improved! It’s 1000% delicious!

“These have become a favorite for our family. My grandkids asked me if I could make some and send them to them (600 miles away) so I got some festive foil wrappers and will be sending them soon. Your Grandma is/was awesome!”

Nancy

Where This Recipe Comes From

For so many people, including myself, these caramels could be considered my grandma’s food legacy, the single recipe that we’ll always remember her by.

Each Christmas day, Grandma Klein would offer two pans of her homemade chocolate caramels. One pan with nuts, one pan without. I always went for the no-nuts, but if that pan was emptied I had no problem moving on to the one with nuts!

I smile to think about Christmas memories:

• Playing at Grandma Klein’s house on Christmas day. Her little house at the end of the street was filled to the brim with cousins, cousins, everywhere!
• Listening to my mom, grandma, and many aunts bustling away in the kitchen, preparing the feast. Their happy chatter and laughter could rival my boombox any day!
• Snitching Grandma Klein’s homemade chocolate caramels. She always made two pans. One with nuts, one without.
• Singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to Jesus at our small town church’s Christmas program, in the same angel costume I had worn the previous year. And the year before that.  AND the year before that!
• Visiting Grandpa and Grandma Renelt at their winter Florida home, celebrating with a decorated Christmas palm tree instead of our usual evergreen.
• Slurping Grandma Renelt’s heavenly oyster stew on Christmas Eve.
• Baking Christmas goodies with Mom and my sisters.
• Making homemade ice cream, taking turns cranking the pail by hand. And taking that first spoonful…yum!
• Waking up on Christmas morning to Mom’s magnificently tender caramel rolls.
• Indulging in just one more of Aunt June’s cream wafer cookies or one more piece of Aunt Donna’s cranberry cake. (Yes, I have LOTS of fond food memories!)
• Listening to Grandpa Renelt or my dad read the Christmas story from the Bible on Christmas Eve, the room reverently silent.
• Looking out across the farm, at the lit star that Dad hung from the northward pointing peak of the barn, imagining that one bright star so many years ago…

Christmas has become increasingly more about focusing on finding joy and meaning, about savoring the stuff that’s real. And passing all this good stuff (including the food!) on to my own kids.

So, here’s that recipe that I love so much, an annual Christmas treat.  I hope you like it, too.

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Grandma Klein’s Chocolate Caramels

Yield: 1 9×13 pan

prep time: 10 minutes mins

cook time: 20 minutes mins

total time: 30 minutes mins

My grandma’s recipe for Chocolate Caramels is a family tradition. It wouldn’t be Christmas without this homemade treat!

4.5 Stars (81 Reviews)

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Ingredients

• 1 cup unsalted butter, plus more for buttering the pan
• 1½ cups heavy cream
• 1½ cups corn syrup
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 4 ounces unsweetened chocolate baking bar, roughly chopped (I use Baker’s brand, in the baking aisle.)
• 1½ cups chopped roasted & salted nuts, optional (I prefer without!)
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

Instructions

• Generously butter a 9" x 13" pan and set aside.
• In a heavy-bottomed, medium-sized saucepan over medium to medium-high heat, stir together butter, cream, corn syrup, sugar, and chocolate. Once everything is melted together, add a candy/kitchen thermometer to the saucepan to gauge the temperature – this is very important. Stir gently, and quite constantly, with a spatula or wooden spoon until mixture just reaches 240°F, and then quickly pull saucepan from heat. Do not let the caramel mixture overcook, or you will have hard caramel. Likewise, undercooking will result in softer caramels. Note: this will take some time, be prepared to stand by the stove for awhile, stirring, stirring, stirring.
• With saucepan off the heat, stir in the vanilla. Then stir in nuts, if using. Pour mixture into prepared pan. Let cool to room temperature, then refrigerate. See Notes below for how to cut into individual caramels.

Video

Notes

If you prefer regular caramels, omit the chocolate.

For super clean cuts: With refrigerated caramel, I first cut around the outer edge of the pan to loosen the caramel from the sides, and then invert caramel onto a wood cutting board that has a layer of wax paper on it, and then flip the caramel slab right-side up again. Let warm a bit. Depending on the consistency of the caramel, this can take 20 to 60 minutes. If it’s hard to cut, wait another 15 minutes and repeat as necessary. Then I use a long non-serrated knife to cut.

To gift the chocolate caramels: simply cut them into your desired size and wrap in small pieces of wax paper.

A pan of chocolate caramels keeps well in the refrigerator for a few weeks. Or freeze for up to 3 months – this works best when you wrap individual caramels in wax paper. Allow frozen caramels to come to room temperature before eating. 

recipe from Grandma Klein’s recipe box, originally from her dad’s (my Great Grandpa Braun’s) sister, Victoria Sand

Nutrition Information:

Serving: 1 Calories: 78kcal Carbohydrates: 9g Protein: 1g Fat: 5g Saturated Fat: 2g Polyunsaturated Fat: 2g Cholesterol: 9mg Sodium: 12mg Sugar: 8g

Nutrition information is automatically calculated by Spoonacular. I am not a nutritionist and cannot guarantee accuracy. If your health depends on nutrition information, please calculate again with your own favorite calculator.

Did you make this recipe?Please leave a comment below. And share a photo on Instagram with the hashtag #afarmgirlsdabbles or tag @farmgirlsdabble!

© Brenda | A Farmgirl’s Dabbles

Cuisine: American

Course: Dessert

Here are a few more favorite family Christmas treats you might like:

• Mom’s Ultra Soft and Tender Caramel Rolls
• Mom’s Homemade Peanut Butter Cups
• Patsy’s Chocolate Covered Cherry Cordials
• Donna’s Cranberry Cake with Butter Cream Sauce

(This post was previously published December 2010. Grandma passed away in the fall of 2017 and I wanted to update this post with new photos and share it again. Because it really is one of my favorite recipes of all time. Photographs and some of the text were updated December 2017.)