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These caramelized, candied walnuts are quite a treat. Toss them into your salad, over popcorn, or straight into your mouth. Crunch. Crunch.
I love this easy method of making the candied nuts where everything goes into the pan at once. Other methods I’ve tried left me with globs of candy on the nuts rather than a more even coating.
It also roasts the nuts at the same time so you don’t have to pre-toast them, then add them back to the pan to be coated, blah, blah. Who needs extra steps?
It seriously takes about 5 minutes on the stove and 5 minutes to cool. The finished product is delicious! My husband was sampling them right out of the pan. P.S. This recipe can easily be doubled.
Ingredients for Candied Walnuts:
1 cup walnut halves/pieces (you can also use this recipe for candied pecans)
1/4 cup white granulated sugar (not coarse sugar)
1 Tbsp unsalted butter
How To Make 5 Minute Candied Walnuts:
1. Heat a medium non-stick skillet over medium heat, add 1 cup walnuts, 1/4 cup granulated sugar and 1 Tbsp butter.
2. Heat over medium heat for 5 minutes, stirring frequently (with a heat proof non-plastic spatula) so your mixture doesn’t burn (especially towards the end). When the sugar mixture starts melting, stir constantly until all sugar is melted and nuts are coated.
3. Transfer immediately onto a sheet of parchment paper and separate the nuts right away. Using two spatulas will make this task go faster.
You don’t want to give the nuts a chance to turn into a wad of inseparable delicious goodness unless you are the only person who will be enjoying the wad ;). Seriously, move quickly from the time the nuts are coated until they are separated out on the parchment paper.
Once the coating hardens (5-7 minutes), you can transfer them to a bowl and either inhale them right then and there or save ’em for a salad or something.
Enjoy, {crunch} pin it to your “recipes to keep forever” board, {crunch. crunch} and let me know how you liked the candied walnuts! {Crunch. Cruuunch. Crunch}
5 minute Candied Walnuts
Ingredients
- 1 cup walnut halves/pieces, you can also use this recipe for candied pecans
- 1/4 cup white granulated sugar, (not coarse sugar)
- 1 Tbsp unsalted butter
Instructions
- Heat a medium non-stick skillet over medium heat, add 1 cup walnuts, 1/4 cup granulated sugar and 1 Tbsp butter.
- Heat over medium heat for 5 minutes, stirring frequently so your mixture doesn't burn (especially towards the end). When the sugar mixture starts melting, stir constantly until all sugar is melted and nuts are coated.
- Transfer immediately onto a sheet of parchment paper and separate the nuts right away. Using two spatulas will make this task go faster. You don't want to give the nuts a chance to turn into a wad of inseparable delicious goodness unless you are the only person who will be enjoying the wad ;). Seriously, move quickly from the time the nuts are coated until they are separated out on the parchment paper.
- Once the coating hardens (5-7 minutes), you can transfer them to a bowl and enjoy!
P.S. If you haven’t allready, make sure to try our honey roasted almonds. They are also amazing
Natasha Kravchuk
Hi! I'm Natasha Kravchuk. Here you'll find delicious, trusted recipes with easy step-by-step photos and videos. 
Sugar clumped together. Walnuts didn’t get coated.
Hi Brianna, that can happen over too high of heat. I think I need to do a video tutorial on this one!
OMG we made a batch of these to put in a carrot cake and ended up eating the whole batch before being able to put it in the cake and had to make another. Will definitely be making these again!
That’s so great! It sounds like you have a new favorite snack, Harmon!
Hello, how would you store these once making a load for an event? How long do they keep?
Hi Sophie! They are fine to store at room temperature in an air-tight container for up to a week. Or you can refrigerate/freeze for longer storage. If you refrigerate, the humidity can make them stick together so watch for that.
Not sure how to rate this. All recipes I’ve tried have not coated the walnuts evenly, I end up with globs of browned sugar not an even sugar coating. What am I doing wrong?
Hi Vanessa. Are you using a large granule sugar? If so, it will not melt down the same. I would also suggest lowering the heat and melting a sugar on lower heat. I hope that helps.
The sugar did not melt at all but became lump of crystals, so I fixed it by pouring 3 tbsp of boiling water to melt the sugar and kept stirring till it wasthick and coating the walnuts, then i transferred it to parchment paper and separated it . I also added ground cinnamon and a pinch of salt to balance the taste while I was cooking it.
Hi Geena! Did you use a different type of sugar? If the granules were larger it would take longer to melt down. You may also try to melt it on lower heat and stir less often. Vigorously starting and using high heat could cause it to get clumpy. I hope that helps.
I found this recipe about 3 months ago and I love it! I’ve made it for a number of my friends. My husband said he needed his own jar because I was eating them faster than him!
Warning…they are really good!