We’ve been searching high and low for something to replace the corn syrup called for in some of our favorite baking recipes. Something less processed, without high fructose corn syrup, and ideally, easy to make at home. We've finally found it.
We originally came across this recipe in the book Marshmallows by Eileen Talanian (a book we also used when developing our Vanilla Marshmallow recipe). Talanian's instructions are to boil sugar and water to a specific temperature, at which point it becomes what’s called an invert sugar.
Invert sugars are what help keep the melted sugar in candy and baking recipes from re-crystallizing. Corn syrup is the most widely available commercially-made invert sugar, and this is why most recipes call for it. Talanian calls her homemade invert sugar “Marshmallow Syrup” and says she prefers it to corn syrup for the cleaner flavor and fluffier texture it gives marshmallows.
We immediately started wondering if this syrup could be used to replace the corn syrup in a lot of our other favorite recipes, like pecan pie and fudgy brownies. Every time we’ve used it so far, the syrup performs just as well as corn syrup, and sometimes better. The health debates surrounding corn syrup aside, we’re mostly happy to be using a product that’s one less step processed.
This cane sugar syrup can be a little tricky to make, as working with sugar always seems to be! We’ve made several batches with many degrees of success and failure, and we’ve learned a lot of tricks along the way. All these are incorporated into the recipe below so you can benefit from our experience. Even so, if you find that something works or doesn’t work for you, please let us know! Also, reading through this tutorial on working with sugar before diving in can be very helpful.
DIY Cane Sugar Syrup
Makes about 1 quart
Gratefully adapted from “Marshmallows” by Eileen Talanian
2 cups (16 ounces) water
5 1/3 cups (2 lbs + 10 ounces) granulated cane sugar
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
pinch of salt
Equipment:
4-quart sauce pan - one step larger or smaller should be ok
a candy thermometer that can clip to the side of the pan
stainless steel or silicone spoon - not wood
pastry brush
Clean glass jars with lids - half-pint jars are ideal
Combine all of the ingredients in the saucepan and stir until the sugar is completely moistened. Clip the candy thermometer to the side of the pan and set the pan over high heat. Do not stir the sugar after this point.
As the sugar comes to a boil, dip the pastry brush in a dish of water and brush down the sides. This dissolves any sugar crystals on the sides of the pan that could cause the syrup to re-crystallize. Once the syrup comes to a full boil, you don’t need to brush the sides anymore. (If you don’t have a pastry brush, you can also cover the pan with a lid for two minutes just as the sugar comes to a boil. The steam trapped in the pan will wash any crystals from the sides.)
Boil the syrup until it just barely reaches a temperature of 240° Fahrenheit (in other words, its better to be a few degrees under than a few degrees over). Immediately turn off the heat, remove the candy thermometer, and carefully move the pan to a cool spot on the stove or a cooling rack. Allow the syrup to sit undisturbed until it has cooled completely, at least an hour.
Gently pour the cooled syrup into clean glass jars, seal with the lids, and store in the cupboard. Store them where they won’t be jostled too much, as this can cause the syrup to crystallize. It will keep for at least two months, but we’ve stored it for longer without any changes to the syrup.
To Use the Syrup - This syrup tends to be thicker than corn syrup and can be difficult to pour or measure. To make it a little more workable, remove the metal lid from the glass jar and microwave the jar of corn syrup on HIGH in 30 second bursts until it’s pourable. This usually seems to take a total of 1 - 1.5 minutes. Alternatively, you can put the jar in a saucepan of simmering water to warm the syrup.
One Last Note - Re-heating can sometimes cause the syrup to begin crystallizing. Because of this, we’ve found it best to store the syrup in half-pint (1 cup) jars, which is what most recipes call for. This way we can heat and use one portion at a time without leftovers.
Related: Is It Cost Effective to Make Pantry Staples Yourself?
(Image: Emma Christensen)
How To Make Perfect Bacon in the Oven
How To Cook Tender, Chewy Wheat Berries on the Stovetop
Good Food to Share 
The Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces 
Apartment Therapy Presents 
The Eight-Step Home Cure 
Straw Mat from The ...
Must-See Small Cool Homes: Week Two
Beth's Romantic & Retro Residence
Interesting! Though, in our home, cane syrup is the stuff my husband's family makes from boiling down the sugar cane they harvest on their cane farm in Florida. (Kinda like making maple syrup.) I think I'll have a hard time convincing the hubs to call *this* cane syrup, but I'm sure my husband can suck it up to try a new corn syrup alternative.
On the "renaming" of corn syrup, see
http://www.thenameinspector.com/
Adding lemon juice or another acid will keep sugar from recrystallizing. Just add a small amount, couple of tsp should do it. If you add too much you'll taste it.
Could you use this as a substitute for Golden Syrup, do you think?
My understanding is that it's also a kind of invert sugar syrup. I've found some English recipes that call for it and never could figure out a substitution.
Ooooh - this is a must-try recipe for me. My daughter is allergic to corn. We've substituted Lyle's Golden Syrup for the corn syrup in Alton Brown's marshmallow recipe with great results (use tapioca starch for the corn starch). This would be much easier to have on hand.
The biggest no no people usually do with cooking sugar that ends with recrystalization and all the evils of boiling sugar is stirring the sugar/water when they start! Don't do it! If you watch lotso f people who make candies and deal with sugar a ton they just dump it all together and COVER the pot. By not stirring you don't have stray sugar bits on the sides to worry about but even if you do somehow, the steam in the covered pot will catch the odd crystals. After a minute or so of it covered, uncover, stick in your thermometer and it will be perfect.
@Jordanna, if you're NOT a spamming troll (which i fully recognize is a possibility), take note that this is not a substitute for HFCS, but rather for Light Corn Syrup (which is, as far as I know, NOT undergoing a "name change") like KARO, etc., which is called for in recipes for fudge, marshmallows, pecan pie and the like.
Check out a brief primer, sweetie: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corn_syrup
In what way is this less processed? You're starting with highly processed refined sugar and processing it further in your kitchen.
Interesting, Emma! I've made invert sugar to use for sorbet-making (it keeps the sorbet from getting icy when frozen), but never knew it could be a corn syrup substitute.
The recipe I used mixes water, sugar and citric acid. Here's the recipe that introduced me to the idea.
@ereuyi - The flavor of this syrup vs. golden syrup would be a little different, but I think it would work the chemistry of the recipe just fine. I know sometimes golden syrup is used as a topping (like caramel sauce) and I don't think this cane syrup would be as good for things like that.
@jmorri - Thanks for the tip! I will definitely try this next time I make the syrup and add a note to the post if it seems to work better (as it sounds like it might!).
@Polly - You're right that this is still a processed product. White sugar certainly doesn't spring naturally from the earth as is! But the process for making corn syrup requires a lot of pretty heavy-duty chemical processes that, as far as we know, can only be duplicated in a lab or factory setting. With this syrup, we are at least controlling one step of the process ourselves. Plus, there are a lot of health concerns about corn syrup specifically, and having a the option of a cane sugar substitute is helpful for many people.
And it's kinda fun to be able to make something like this in just a pot on the stove! I'm a geek like that. :)
@Polly S. Granted most sugar is highly processed, but it's easy to get natural sugars that are basically just crystalized cane juice. And I wouldn't put disolving sugar in water over heat in the same bucket as the kind of industrial application of enzymes that's used to make corn syrup these days.
Of course, corn syrup isn't HFCS, and I don't think I've seen any studies that come to the conclusion that corn syrup is anyworse then any other simple sugars.
I used Golden Syrup last year to make my caramel corn for Yule. It worked out very well. This year I will try it with this syrup. Thanks! Oh...I could make my Peppermint Marshmallows with it too...cool!
Two comments:
1) Corn Syrup is not the same thing as high fructose corn syrup. It is mostly glucose and dextrose.
2) This is different from an inverted sugar and will not prevent crystallization (like corn syrup does in fudge)
Sorry I mean the inverted sugar will not prevent crystallization of cane sugar.
Is cane syrup hard to find? I just keep Roger's Golden for when things call for corn syrup. Is that just a Canadian thing or is there some reason when this is better?
No, I am not a troll! And I do know that corn syrup is not the same as HFCS. I just think the debates about different types of sugars - and the "rebranding" of some kinds - is interesting.
For those interested in finding out how HFCS is made at home; watch 'King Corn' :
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/kingcorn/
We found it at our library, but your local video store may have it.
Unless you're allergic to corn I'm not really seeing how substituting highly processed cane sugar for corn syrup is really that much better. Corn syrup is not as highly processed as HFCS is and doesn't contain as much fructose as table sugar does since it's primarily glucose. It kind of drives me bonkers when people label one sugar as evil and promote another one as being better when really overall ALL sugar is not that good for you unless in moderation and that includes agave, honey, maple, fruit sugars and any other sugar you can think of.
http://www.seriouseats.com/2010/06/what-is-the-difference-between-corn-syrup-and-hfcs-high-fructose-corn-syrup.html
I'm not sure this would be a very good substitute for corn syrup as cane sugar (or even beet) is sucrose, which is sweeter than glucose, which is mostly what corn syrup is.
Just a note. While corn syrup is not HFCS, most commercially packaged corn syrups (Karo, etc) have HFCS added to them.
This recipe is awful. It simply didn't work. I followed the directions exactly and it was not pourable once cooled. I'm definitely not going to try the pecan pie recipe that calls for this stuff. I'm going to go get my Martha Stewart cookbook out. That woman knows how to do sweet.
Note to Polly: Corn sugar is digested differently from cane or beet sugar - and I've *never* been able to digest it; and now I cannot eat any corn products, and maybe never on that, either. It is a great service to have this recipe. My father, who was a professional candy maker maintained in the 1940s that corn sugars were the hardest of all to digest. It's a generality I cannot substantiate, but is one I can verify individually.
Thank you very much for this recipe. I just made it and used in in a hard candy recipe. Though I'm new to candy making, the syrup and candy turned out just fine. I am very happy to have a substitute for corn syrup since I don't trust corn syrup so much due to its close relationship to HFCS. Making my own cane syrup is also another assurance that my candy is natural and free of hidden chemicals or preservatives.
It is commendable that you seek to replace high fructose corn syrup with something less toxic, without the health problems associated with high fructose syrup. Cane sugar(sucrose) is broken down into fructose and glucose once it is ingested which takes you back to square one. Glucose is not at this time linked to the same problems as fructose, so glucose syrup is probably the least harmful sugar to use according to current knowledge.
This is such a great recipe! Thank you so much! I'm going to try to make this with evaporated cane juice (not highly processed like refined white sugar).
@ Polly S. - Many of my readers are allergic to corn, so this is an excellent alternative for them.
Another reason for posting a recipe for Corn Syrup (and thank you for this!) is for those of us who no longer live in the USA. No Karo in France. Except by ordering online and having it shipped but honestly, who wants to spend $10 for a bottle of Karo?
I tried this today for the first time. I think it will work when I reheat it to add to my recipe, but it is VERY VERY VERY hard and sticky. I was able to spoon globs of it from the pan into smaller containers to store, but I lost a lot of it in the pan. Another recipe I tried that had me stir it a lot crystallized after it cooled, so I know that's not the problem here. It is in syrup form, just not pourable. My thermometer only went to 220, but I did the cold water test and it looked ready to remove from the heat.
Do you think I left it on too long or not long enough for it to come out that sticky?
I have a large container of Rogers' Golden Syrup that is half full. It has crystallized and I wonder if it can be saved for baking purposes. There is some liquid on the top but the rest is almost solid.
@LaCheshireChat
That's why I'm here! :)
Hello Kitchn
Please, I want to ask if I can use this recipe for making rolled fondant. I cant find corn syrup in my area and I wanted to make rolled fondant that uses corn syrup instead of glucose, I feel this is a marked difference. Will this recipe work well in it.
Thanks for the reply.
Wale
I'm looking forward to trying this recipe.
I think the reason folks are avoiding Corn Syrup now, is that most of the Corn for processing that's grown in the US is Geneticallly Modified B t Corn. Some recent studies show that the B t corn is linked to the development of tumors. We don't eat anything with Corn unless it non - G M O. It's the same reason we avoid Beet Sugar, because most of the Beet Sugar in the US is geneticallly modified.
Nobody has mentioned yet that a very good reason to find a good alternative to corn syrup is that nearly all corn syrup is made from GMO corn (unless it's organic). I know that corn syrup isn't exactly a health food, but my number one food conviction is no GMO and I, for one, am really happy to find this recipe. My family's 4 generation fudge recipe depends on it!
Hello Kitchn
Please, I will like to know if I can use this recipe to make corn syrup for Rolled Fondant paste.
Is the corn syrup close to high fructose corn syrup in chemistry.
I want to go into making pre-made rolled fondant for commercial use and I was hoping I could use this corn syrup instead of glucose which is so common around me.
My email is : cakesbywhales@gmail.com
I await your reply.
Thank you.
Wale Taiwo