Homemade Horehound Candy Recipes

HOREHOUND COUGH DROPS WITH HONEY & GRAPEFRUIT

Steps:

• Add horehound and water to a small saucepan. Bring to a boil, and simmer gently for 20 minutes. Liquid should look almost like coffee.
• Let liquid cool. Strain off the liquid, squeezing all possible liquid out of the horehound. Return strained liquid to small saucepan, and discard the horehound.
• Add honey to horehound liquid. Stirring very frequently, simmer gently until it reaches the "hard crack" stage - about 300 degrees on a candy thermometer. My preferred method is to drip a little drop from a spoon into a jar of ice water. When the drip turns into a very hard little ball (like a cough drop!), the mixture is ready.
• Pour liquid onto a cookie sheet, or into a 13x9 pan - something with a big surface area. You want to the mixture to start cooling quickly so you can work with it!
• Working from the edges, scoop up teaspoonfuls of the mixture, and roll into balls. Place on parchment-lined cookie sheet, being careful not to let cough drops touch each other.
• You do have to work fairly quickly to get it all rolled before the end of it firms up too much. But there's plenty of time to enjoy the project, and enlist the help of little hands! It's FUN playing with super sticky "candy!"
• When the cough drops are COMPLETELY cooled (I like to wait at least an hour), roll them up individually in squares of parchment paper. I just tear parchment paper into very rough squares, but a size about 2"x2" works nicely.
• Store in an airtight container in a cool, dry location.

OLD FASHIONED HARD CANDY

Steps:

• Generously coat a cookie sheet with confectioners' sugar, and set aside.
• In a heavy bottomed saucepan, stir together the white sugar, water and corn syrup until sugar has dissolved. Bring to a boil over medium-high and cook to a temperature of 300 to 310 degrees F (149 to 154 degrees C), or until a small amount of syrup dropped into cold water forms hard, brittle threads. Remove from heat, and stir in the flavored oil and food coloring.
• Immediately pour the sugar mixture onto the prepared cookie sheet in a thin stream (this helps it cool). When the candy is cool enough for the outer edge to hold its shape, cut into bite size pieces with scissors. Let cool completely, then store in an airtight container.

HOMEMADE HOREHOUND CANDY

Steps:

• Wash horehound leaves and put in saucepan. Add water and bring to boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes, mashing occasionally with fork. Remove from heat; cover and let cool (needs to stand at least 1/2 hour to infuse.
• While infusion in cooling, butter a 9x13 pan.
• Drain horehound leaves into measuring cup (I use a coffee filter to strain it). Be sure to squeeze all the liquid from the leaves. Make sure you have at least 1 cup of liquid. Discard leaves.
• Pour liquid into a 4 quart saucepan. Add brown sugar and syrup. Bring to a boil and cook to 300 degrees on a candy thermometer (hard crack stage).
• Pour into prepared pan and let cool. Just before it sets up, score into squares with a knife to make it easier to break apart. When cool and set, break into pieces and store in airtight container.
• Note: The infusion (liquid from the leaves) can be frozen to use later.

OLD FASHIONED HOREHOUND COUGH DROPS

Steps:

• Boil the horehound leaves in the 2 cups water for 10 minutes; discard leaves.
• Add twice as much honey as the remaining liquid and stir the mixture smooth.
• Then blend 2 cups of sugar with 1/8 tsp.
• of cream of tartar in a saucepan, and add the honey-horehound mixture.
• Stir over medium heat until sugar melts.
• Then lower flame and continue stirring till a dollop of the candy forms a hard ball when dropped in cold water.
• At that point, pour syrup into buttered baking dish and cut into small squares as candy begins to harden.
• Finally, roll in confectioners sugar and then granulated sugar and store in airtight containers.