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HOW TO MAKE ROCK CANDY FOR A GEODE CAKE

In this tutorial I will show you how to rock candy (sugar candy) that you can use in a Geode Cake. Just take note that to make your own candy will take approximately 2 weeks so ensure you allow plenty of time to make the candy and allow it to dry.

ITEMS YOU WILL NEED:

1 cup water

3 cups of white granulated sugar

Food colouring – optional

Flavouring – optional

Long narrow stemmed glasses or jars (I used plastic champagne glasses)

Wooden skewers

Pegs

STEP 1
Wet skewers with water about 1/3 of the way up the skewer and roll in granulated sugar. The granulated sugar will become seed crystals, which give the dissolved sugar something to cling to and a point at which to start crystallising.

The seed crystals make it easier for the rock candy to grow and may speed up the process by giving the sugar an easy target for attachment.

Allow the skewers to dry completely before proceeding to the next step (I let mine dry overnight). If the sugar is not firmly stuck to the skewer it may fall off in the glass and the crystallisation will occur on the sugar on the bottom of the glass and not on your skewer.

STEP 2
Heat the water in a saucepan and put in 1/3 of the sugar and stir until completely dissolved and the water appears clear. Continue to add in the sugar at intervals, stirring and dissolving completely before adding in more sugar.

If the solution is cloudy or you find the sugar stops dissolving, turn the heat up so the water reaches a vigorous boil. Hot water has a higher saturation point than cold water, so turning up the heat will allow you to mix in the rest of the sugar.

Remove the solution from the heat and stir through any colour or flavouring if you don’t want a clear crystal.

You only need a few drops of flavouring. Drops for colour will depend on how light or dark you want your crystals. I made a number of different shades of purple so that I was able to obtain a gradual change of colour in the geode on my cake.

Allow the solution to cool for at least 30 minutes before you pour into your glasses / jars – especially if you are using plastic ones like I did.

STEP 3

Pour the solution into glasses, filling almost to the top.

Place a sugar-coated skewer into a glass, making sure it does not touch the top or bottom of the glass (leave at least 2 cm from the bottom) and then attach at the top with a peg. Continue with all remaining skewers as per photo below.

Place glasses in a cool, dark place and resist the urge to touch or tap the glass, as this could knock your crystals off the stick as they are growing.

Wait one to two weeks for your rock candy to be ready. I waited about 10 days before removing mine.

There will be a crust on the top of the surface of the water. I used a knife to gently break through, keeping away from the crystals that had formed on the skewers.

If the rock candy is stuck to the sides, run some hot water on the bottom of the glass. This should loosen the sugar enough so that you can pull your candy out without damaging it.

Remove the skewer and you can rest on wax paper to dry (takes about 2 days). In my case I removed the crystals from the skewers and dried them in lumps on wax paper (see below) as I did not need them on the skewers and thought they would dry faster this way.