Making your own popcorn, let alone kettle corn, is truly such an empowering skill to possess. A delicious snack anytime! Kettle corn is a widely loved dessert for satisfying the sweet, salty, and crunchy craving. Popcorn has a neutral flavor making it a perfect for pumpkin spice. You can practically add any spice to popcorn and have it taste good. We filmed and tested 4 desserts to see which could handle pumpkin spice best. Tune into the video below to see what we determined!
We made this as a part of a test of four pumpkin spice desserts.
To see how they stack up, read on here:
You can see the other three pumpkin spice recipes here:
Don’t get it mistaken. Kettle corn is not caramel corn. Kettle corn is the quick caramel corn if anything related. Caramel corn involves making a rich caramel sauce, then immediately tossing cooked popcorn with the hot caramel, tossing and spinning until each piece of popcorn is coated. A much more patient to do without the proper utensils. Kettle corn is all about melting sugar around the kernel of popcorn.
You start kettle corn like you would making any homemade popcorn, with some oil in a pot over high heat. The preheating process is important here to make sure as soon as the kernels hit the oil, they start cooking and supercharging. The way to check this process is adding one or two kernels to the hot oil and waiting for them to pop. Once they pop, it’s time to add in the rest of our kernels. We have about 30 seconds before they start to pop, so first you stir the kernels around to coat them all evenly in oil and start to agitate the kernel. Right before you shut the lid, add the sugar and spices.
Making homemade popcorn is very rewarding, but do take caution as you are working with very hot oil. When making popcorn, be sure to have a hand ready to adjust the heat, have a bowl ready to dump the popcorn, and have proper heat handling gloves.
When you add the sugar and spices into the popcorn, the sugar will start to melt around the kernels. This is hot sticky sugar so get those hot mitts ready. Using both hands, hold the lid with your thumbs and the handles with your other fingers and shake shake shake Senora. Be sure to shake over the heat to prevent burning. It will be easier to mix as the majority of the kernels pop acting as it’s own stirring mechanism by the sheer force of each pop. Turn your heat to low as the final kernels pop and turn off the heat.
Immediately dump the hot popcorn carefully in the bowl, then use a wooden spoon to break up the clusters. Season the popcorn with salt at this point so it will stick. Don’t test the popcorn until it has cooled down at least two minutes.
Pumpkin Spiced Kettle Corn
Yield(s): Makes 4 cups
5m prep time
8m cook time
Diet: Gluten-Free, Low-Calorie
you’re making mealtime meaningful.
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter
- 1/2 cup popcorn kernels
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 2 teaspoons pumpkin spice
- Kosher salt, to taste
Preparation
- In a large pot over medium-high heat, add oil, butter, and popcorn kernels. Let the kernels cook for 1 – 2 minutes and once they start popping, add sugar and pumpkin spice mixture. Stir with a wooden spoon then cover with lid.
- Let popcorn pop aggressively, swirling the pan and shaking it as it pops, once the popping dies down turn off the heat.
- Remove the lid and dump popcorn in a bowl. Season with salt and use a wooden spoon to break up the clusters.