What is the difference between toffee and caramel?

What is the difference between toffee and caramel? - Close-Up Photo of a Mouth-Watering Plate of Stroopwafels

I always wondered and hope someone here can clear it up for me.



Best Answer

In short, Butter. Toffee has Butter, caramel does not. Of course there are lots of variations, and there are some candies called 'Caramels', which may in fact be hard toffees. The softness or hardness of a toffee depends on the amount of fat added, and the temperature to which the sugar is raised.

Strictly speaking, though, caramel is either 'dry' (pure white sugar), or 'wet' (white sugar and water), heated until it is browns, more or less, to taste, and stopped before burning.




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Quick Answer about "What is the difference between toffee and caramel?"

Caramel is made out of sugar, water, and cream or milk. Toffee, however, is made out of sugar and butter. The next difference has to do with temperature. Caramel is heated to 248° F (AKA the end of the "firm ball" stage of cooking sugar) and toffee is heated to 300° F (AKA the "hard crack" stage).

Do toffee and caramel taste the same?

Toffee is a hard candy that combines the classic cooked sugar sweetness of caramel with the richness of butter. Technically, toffee is butterscotch\u2014a combination of butter and sugar\u2014cooked to what's known as the hard-crack stage in confectionery: over 300 degrees Fahrenheit on a candy thermometer.

What is the difference between caramel toffee and butterscotch?

When it comes to butterscotch and toffee you've got a lot of the same ingredients. They also use butter, vanilla, and heavy whipping cream, but it's the sugar that differentiates these two from caramel. While caramel uses white sugar, both butterscotch and toffee use brown sugar.

What is the difference between caramel and toffee sauce?

Toffee sauce is similar to caramel sauce in the sense that it's made from sugar, butter and/or cream, the main difference is the degree to which it's cooked. Toffee is only cooked to the point that the sugar in it melts, at which point it becomes usable.

Is butterscotch and toffee the same thing?

Toffee vs ButterscotchWhile butterscotch is cooked to a soft-crack stage, toffee is produced by allowing that same butter and brown sugar mixture to reach the hard-crack stage. Butterscotch tends to be chewy and pliable; toffee is brittle and more breakable.



What is the difference between toffee and caramel?




More answers regarding what is the difference between toffee and caramel?

Answer 2

"Caramel" is a substance which is created by heating sugar. It is hard at room temperature, aromatic, and has many uses as an ingredient. It can be used "pure", for example poured into very thin slices, which are used for cake decoration. More frequently, it is dissolved in liquids to make a sauce or creme.

"Toffee" is a kind of confection. It is made by adding butter, and sometime other ingredients, to hot caramel, and then shaping it into small suckable hard candies. It is also possible to add more ingredients to change the texture, as in Storck's Toffifee, which are chewy candies. In such cases, you could say that toffee is also an ingredient sometimes.

The aroma of toffee is mostly the aroma of caramel, because this is the main ingredient. But they are not the same thing, one is an ingredient and the other is (originally) a candy.


As Robin Betts mentioned, some candies can also be called "caramels", which is a second meaning of the word "caramel". There, you cannot really draw a line of difference, because the usage is not consistent. The same candy may be considered "a caramel" or "a toffee" by different speakers.

Sources: Stack Exchange - This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Exchange and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

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