Caramel salted popcorn

I am a fan of popcorn, who isn't? I love the stuff, in fact one of the things I look forward to whenever I get to the United States is their popcorn, The cheese flavoured ones I could eat by the bag-full.

One pre-made treat I do sometimes buy is the slightly sweet salted organic popcorn, my children love it.  And husband.

Usually for a school snack I just microwave some popcorn, lightly salt it or leave it plain. Then I came up with this recipe and the little feet come pitter pattering out of bed at night to grab before it can even make it to the lunch box. 

Caramel salted popcorn

1 cup popcorn
1 tbsp vegetable oil
1/4 cups raw sugar
30 g butter
Sea salt

The popcorn

In a large pot heat the vegetable oil.
Add the popcorn, I like to have a good layer of popcorn in the base of the pot. 
Make sure the kernels of corn are all coated in the oil.
With the lid on, allow them to pop, I remove them from the heat when they slow right down. 
Leave the heat on though. 

The caramel

Now you need to remove the popcorn from the pot, put it into a large bowl.
Put the pot back on the stove, add the sugar and let it just come to melt without burning.
Add the butter and stir.

Add the popcorn back to the pot and toss it around in the caramel to coat it.
Add as much or as little sea salt as you like.

These are just beautifully lightly coated in caramel and are crisp, not sticky.
They will keep in an airtight container for several days.

birthday

A few weeks back would-be-organised me said "You must organise a party soon, don't leave it to the last possible minute."

Would-be-organised me even looked at the Bureau of Meteorology website for the weather two weeks ahead of time. Would-be-organized me said ahhh "75% chance of rain. A bike riding party at the local skate park.. well that wouldn't work out what with 75% chance of rain."

Knowing my luck it would be one of those real blanketed in rain days like we've been having, where the light of 1:30 in the afternoon is all but looking like the end of days. I ummed and ahhhd. I imagined possible scenarios, all of which involved wet food, muddy eight year old boys, and everyone ending up in my living room.

All this procrastinating led to the week of the party and still no plan. Then the mother of all ideas hit me: We could have it at night, we could hire a movie projector, and we could all be cosy indoors & dry. Watching a flick in my lounge room, even our littlest baby could be there.

I knew I'd have to rearrange my entire living space... but hey there would be no muddy feet, no wet kids! I was willing to blank out the idea of popcorn I'd forever be finding in my sofa and the melted malteasers I'd latter find squished on my cushions.

I bought the idea to my son whose party it would be, I didn't have to pitch the idea too hard he was happy... no, he was ecstatic. I had avoided an in-home boys party every other year at all costs, and he's quite the homebody so having a party here for once seemed like the best thing ever to him.

Fast forward two days...

I had hoped that it would be pretty good, but I didn't think It was actually going to look like the cinema in my lounge room. It was great!!! Seeing as I had to pick the projector up the morning of the party, I didn't factor into the project plan losing my husband for most of the afternoon. He was mesmerised by the sheer size we could project onto the wall.

(I should tell you that hiring does work out a lot cheaper when you factor in not only admission but popcorn, drinks ice cream. I think I made an entire pack and a half of popcorn that cost about $2, an equivalent amount would set you back a whopping $50 at the cinemas. That is half the cost of projector hire.)

I beavered on alone in the kitchen as the laughs rolled in from the lounge. He and my daughter Beatrix were watching Megamind, the pair of them hadn't seen it, and they both were laughing loud and long. From the lounge room. While I was in the kitchen, cooking, and alone, did I mention that?

Lucky for me the menu for the night was fairly simple: homemade pizza, hotdogs, spiders. And the cake, of course, but I'd purposefully picked an easier one.

The spiders in particular were a hit. Cream soda and ice cream, ice cream first soda on top, it's like a science experiment they loved it, and hot buttered popcorn, too easy.

Yeah they were loud and silly but it was a lot of fun, we even had time for some photo fun with the lights we had borrowed from a neighbor.

My husband had struggled a little with the noise level so he reigned them in with a couple of games of murder... that worked a charm.

I enjoyed seeing him playing with them, Phoenix was beaming, he'd had an awesome at home party. We'd survived.