Why did my nougat burn?

Question

I attempted to make nougat today and it was an epic failure. The instructions for the sugar and honey solution was to mix it together with 2 tablespoons of water and stir it over heat without boiling until the sugar dissolved. Then wipe any granules on the sides of the pan into the solution and bring it to the boil without stirring at all until it reached 164'C. However the solution smelt burnt before it became of temperature. When we beat it into the egg whites it was in deed burnt and resulted in a rather brown looking charged gooey mess.

I am wondering if it is possible to get the sugar and honey to that temperature without it in fact burning. We did note that it took quite some time (12ish minutes) on a moderate heat to reach the 164° C and even seemed to plateau and dip slightly in temperature while cooking. Would it help if we tried to reach the targeted temperature faster?

I have the ingredients and want to try again tomorrow. Hopefully someone here will be able to prevent a further failure!

Answer 1

Your recipe is broken. If it actually gave you that temperature then discard it and find a new one.

Nougat is made, depending on the recipe, by heating the syrup to "hard ball" or "soft crack" temperatures before beating it into the egg whites.

Candy temperatures are categorized by the behavior of the syrup when dripped into ice water.

Hard ball is around 250F (121C) and looks like this:

Your temperature of 327F (164C) is actually off the chart and is categorized as "caramel" because the syrup has started to break down and the sugars are burning. Caramels have a lovely flavor but it is not going to create the correct texture for nougat. There is also a very fine line between "light caramel" and "horribly burnt" that is best avoided.

I recommend you find a more reasonable recipe.