Why Was My Vanilla Fudge Oily?

Asked by koekoek. Answered on 6th November 2024

Full question

I made the Vanilla Fudge and stirred continuously with a wide, flat, wooden spatula, but after 20 mins. my candy thermometer had not yet reached soft ball stage, though it was attached to the side of the pan for constant monitoring, and carefully positioned so it was not touching the floor of the pan. So I turned the heat up on my induction cooktop, put on a rubber glove to protect my stirring hand from the exploding bubbles, and reached the correct temperature, though by then it was starting to burn on the bottom of my stainless steel saucepan. And then the butter separated.

No amount of whisking with my Bamix re-integrated the butter with the liquid sugar. Eventually, I poured off the melted butter and scraped the fudge into its tin. It still tasted great, though the texture and colour were not what I remembered from my student days in the 1970's. Do I need a better candy thermometer, an enamelled cast iron saucepan or a different electric whisk?

Vanilla Fudge

By Nigella

Our answer

Nigella's Vanilla Fudge (known in New Zealand as Russian Fudge) is made with sugar, butter, condensed milk and regular milk, plus a little golden syrup. The mixture is boiled to soft ball stage, which is around 115c or 240F on a sugar or candy thermometer. If the oil from the butter separates out during cooking then this can be caused by a couple of factors.

From the description, we suspect that the temperature was turned up too quickly to get the fudge to soft ball point. This can "shock" the mixture and cause the oil from the butter to separate out. Dissolve the sugar over a medium to low heat then turn the heat up to medium and bring the mixture to the boil slowly. A heavy-based pan can help, but in our experience induction rings tend to heat the contents of a pan very quickly and we suspect it is the speed at which the mixture was brought to the boil that caused the problem. So it is not particularly necessary to change your equipment, just use a more moderate setting to bring the mixture to the boil or go through a few heat settings to get to the boil rather than going immediately from low to high. There is also a slight possibility that the sugar had not fully dissolved before the mixture was boiled, which can also cause the oil in the butter to separate out. So make sure that the sugar has dissolved fully. If the butter separates again, you may be able to correct it by putting the fudge back in the pan, adding some water and bringing the mixture slowly back up to soft ball temperature. It can dilute the flavour of the fudge slightly but should stop it from being oily.