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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
Worked a treat with raw sugar instead of white sugar. Yum!
Oooh great to know. Thank you! I do keep a bag of raw sugar on hand in the pantry. I’ll try that next time. 🙂
aha, I was looking for this answer, perfect! I only have raw sugar in the house and wasn’t sure if it would melt the same.
Hi Natasha! I just wanted to let you know I made and loved these! So sad they’re gone. I’d love if you’d check out my blog post 🙂 http://piesandplots.net/easy-candied-walnuts/
I loved your post and thank you so much for sharing that with me! 🙂
These were easy and wonderful in a salad with roasted beets and cranberry goat cheese!
That salad sounds amazing! What kind of dressing did you use?
If you take the extra time to brown your butter first, then add the sugar and nuts as directed, you will get a richer more complex flavor. Same for pecan pies.
Thanks for the tip Janice, I will be trying it next time :).
My walnuts came out with a sort of weird cloudy, gritty textured coating rather than a shiny glaze, but they still taste fantastic!
Did the sugar get to the melting point? Sometimes heating it a little longer helps; also make sure you aren’t starting off at too high of heat so the sugar doesn’t burn before it has a chance to melt nicely and coat the nuts. I sure hope that helps! 🙂
Perfect, easy, fast. I did add a bit of cinnamon to flavor.
Made your walnuts for Christmas …made them before 40 years ago, but I stumbled upon your recipie and it brought good memories…and good nuts
That’s so fun when food brings back memories! Thank you for sharing that with me 🙂
My family loves these and they are so easy! I have made them twice already and they never last the hour no matter how much I make lol
I am thinking of doing these for Christmas Eve to snack on after dinner with some homemade eggnog 🙂
Thank you for the great review Laura, and what a great idea for Christmas Eve :).
I just tried making candied walnuts for the first time and used this recipe. I added some cinnamon to it as well, and it was a major hit!
I love the idea of adding cinnamon! Thanks so much for sharing 🙂
Love this super easy recipe! I just made these yummy candied walnuts in just five minutes. Thanks!
Oh I’m so happy you liked them! Did you use them in another recipe or eat them straight up? 🙂
Natasha, thank you for the recipe! It’s delicious and fast! And no oven required. I mixed walnuts and cashews. Also I put in 1-2 tablespoons of brown sugar so maybe that’s why it cooled solid like brittle. Still yummy though!
I bet it was one very tasty brittle! Now I want to add some brown sugar. I sure love brittle 🙂
Here’s what NOT to do: Don’t dump your hot walnut mixture on a granite counter top, the go off immediately not giving enough time to separate. Also, I added an generous sprinkle of kosher salt at the end. Very good! Next time I might add just a teeny bit of roast Thai Red Dragons. Super easy! Thank you!
That’s a good point about not putting them directly onto a cold surface like that. Thank you Deborah! 🙂
Tried the candied walnuts. Thought I followed the directions exactly but the sugar never did melt; just browned and clumped together even though I stirred the whole time. Disappointed. 🙁
That is a bummer. Did you possibly do it over too high of heat? My skillet has a heavy bottom which helps for heat distribution and more even cooking. The only think I can think of is maybe the heat was too high if it browned and clumped. I hope that helps!
Hi Natasha
I had a feta salad at a beautiful restaurant last week and it had candied walnuts on I loved them so much I look for a recipe and found yours. Wonderful, so easy to make and taste divine. Can you keep them in an airtight container at all? If so how long might they last?
Thank you
Sally
x
They should last at least a week in an airtight container or even a ziploc bag. Just make sure they have fully cooled to rom temp before storing. 🙂 Thanks for writing in! 🙂
Love the candied walnuts . Yum.
How do I store them?
Store them at room temperature in a ziploc bag or tupperware. 🙂
I’m making some thumbprint cookies but am thinking about subbing out the vanilla extract for almond and topping the cookies with these walnuts instead of jelly. Any suggestions?
Hmmmm…. that sounds good except I’m not sure how the sugar coating will react when it’s baked. I’ve seen thumbprint cookies with plain walnuts or pecans on top, but not candied ones, but it also might work really well. If you do try it, do let me know how it turns out. 🙂
These look amazing! I am going to try this with raw cashews and drop some cocoanut in to toast with them. Candied cocoanut cashews anyone?
Wow that sounds so good! Let me know how it goes! 🙂
Fan-flipping-tastic!! Next time I will mince the cocoanut down to little shreds, but otherwise these were a huge hit!
That’s so great to know it works well with coconut! Thanks Stacy 🙂
Just one thing. Make the candied nuts as your recipe says and at the end, when the sugar is caramelized, toss with the cocoanut. Then lay out to cool.
Thanks!! 🙂
Loved it! I bought some walnuts that were not fully roasted so they tasted bland on their own. I made half a batch to try it out and basically devoured them all with my mom. She couldn’t stop praising how amazing they were.
That’s so great! Thank you so much for the wonderful review. I’m so happy you and your Mom loved them 🙂
My daughter wanted candied pecans for her caramel apples. Store was out. We started looking for a substitute and stumbled across this recipe . WOW! Easy and delicious! (And a new tradition is born for Halloween caramel apples!) Thank you.
I’m so glad you enjoyed the recipe! That’s so great! 🙂
WARNING …. Make a double batch, because a single will be devoured before they cool!!!
I can’t believe I didn’t already include that warning! :O lol. Thanks Connie 😉