Fudge

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Fudge

Fudge is a type of confectionery

Confectionery

Confectionery is the set of food items that are rich in sugar, any one or type of which is called a confection. Modern usage may include substances rich in artificial sweeteners as well....
which is usually very sweet, extremely rich and sometimes flavored with cocoa

Cocoa

Cocoa is the dried and fully fermented fatty seed of the cacao from which chocolate is made. "Cocoa" can often also refer to the drink commonly known as hot chocolate; Cocoa solids, the dry powder made by grinding cocoa seeds and removing the cocoa butter from the dark, bitter cocoa solids; or it may refer to the combination of both cocoa p...
. It is made by mixing sugar

Sugar

Sugar is a class of edible crystalline substances, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose. Human taste buds interpret its flavor as sweet. Sugar as a basic food carbohydrate primarily comes from sugar cane and from sugar beet, but also appears in fruit, honey, sorghum, sugar maple , and in many other sources....
, butter

Butter

Butter is a dairy product made by churning fresh or fermentation cream or milk. It is generally used as a spread and a condiment, as well as in cooking applications such as baking, sauce making, and frying....
, and milk

Milk

Milk is an opaque white liquid produced by the mammary glands of female mammals . It provides the primary source of nutrition for newborn mammals before they are able to digestion other types of food....
and heating it to the soft-ball stage at , and then beating the mixture while it cools so that it acquires a smooth, creamy consistency. Chocolate

Chocolate

Chocolate comprises a number of raw and processed foods that are produced from the seed of the tropical cacao tree.Chocolate has become one of the most popular flavors in the world....
can also be mixed in to make chocolate fudge. Fudge can also be used in brownies

Chocolate brownie

A chocolate brownie is a flat, baking square or bar, sliced from a type of dense, rich chocolate cake. Brownies come in a variety of forms. They are either fudgy or cakey, depending on their density, and they may include nuts, frosting, cream cheese, chocolate chips, or other ingredients....
.

components of Fudge are very similar to the traditional recipe for Scots Tablet, which is noted in "The Household Book of Lady Grisell Baillie" (1692-1733).

Nutrition Facts

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Calories in ??
Carbs in ??
Fat in ??

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Encyclopedia

Fudge is a type of confectionery

Confectionery

Cocoa

Sugar

Butter

Milk

Chocolate

Chocolate brownie

Origins

The components of Fudge are very similar to the traditional recipe for Scots Tablet, which is noted in "The Household Book of Lady Grisell Baillie" (1692-1733). The term "fudge" is often used in the United Kingdom for a softer variant of the tablet recipe.

One of the first documentations of American-style fudge (containing chocolate) is found in a letter written by Emelyn Battersby Hartridge, a student at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York. She wrote that her schoolmate's cousin made fudge in Baltimore, Maryland

Baltimore, Maryland

Baltimore is an independent city and the largest city in the U.S. state of Maryland in the United States. Baltimore is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay....
in 1886 and sold it for 40 cents a pound. Miss Hartridge got hold of the fudge recipe, and in 1888, made of fudge for the Vassar College

Vassar College

Vassar College is a private, coeducational, Liberal arts colleges in the United States situated in the town of Poughkeepsie , New York, New York, United States....
Senior Auction. This Vassar fudge recipe became quite popular at the school for years to come.

Word of this popular confection spread to other women's colleges. For example, Wellesley and Smith

Smith College

Smith College is a Private university, Independent school Women's colleges in the United States Liberal arts colleges in the United States located in Northampton, Massachusetts....
have their own versions of this fudge recipe.

Geographical consumption patterns

In the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom , the UK or Britain,is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe....
traditional English fudge has become synonymous with Devon

Devon

Devon is a large Counties of England in South West England. The county is also referred to as Devonshire, but that is an entirely unofficial name, rarely used inside of the county but often indicating a shire....
, Cornwall

Cornwall

Cornwall , constitutional Duchy and palatine, is a metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties of England of England, United Kingdom, located at the tip of the south-western peninsula of Great Britain....
, and sometimes Dorset

Dorset

Dorset , is a Counties of England in South West England on the English Channel coast. The county town is Dorchester, Dorset, situated in the south of the county at ....
and is made in a basic range. English fudge is expected to have a firm, slightly crumbly texture. The best known variation is similar to penuche

Penuche

Penuche is a fudge-like candy made from brown sugar, butter, and milk, using no flavorings except for vanilla. Penuche often has a tannish color to it and is lighter than regular fudge....
except that it utilizes granulated sugar instead of brown sugar.

American fudge

"Fudge" in the U.S. is usually understood to be chocolate

Chocolate

Chocolate comprises a number of raw and processed foods that are produced from the seed of the tropical cacao tree.Chocolate has become one of the most popular flavors in the world....
. In fact, the word fudge is used on packaging of cake

Cake

Cake is a form of food that is usually sweet and often Baking. Cakes normally combine some kind of flour, a sweetener , a binding agent , fats , a liquid , flavoring and some form of leavening agent , though many cakes lack these ingredients and instead rely on air bubbles in the dough to expand and cause the cake to rise....
s and brownies

Chocolate brownie

A chocolate brownie is a flat, baking square or bar, sliced from a type of dense, rich chocolate cake. Brownies come in a variety of forms. They are either fudgy or cakey, depending on their density, and they may include nuts, frosting, cream cheese, chocolate chips, or other ingredients....
with "extra" chocolate flavoring or with fluid chocolate in the mixture. Other non-chocolate flavors of fudge are sold in the U.S., including peanut butter

Peanut butter

Peanut butter is a food paste made primarily from ground roasted peanuts, with or without added oil. It is popular throughout the world and is also manufactured in some emerging markets....
and penuche

Penuche

Penuche is a fudge-like candy made from brown sugar, butter, and milk, using no flavorings except for vanilla. Penuche often has a tannish color to it and is lighter than regular fudge....
.

Hot fudge

Hot fudge is made by heating chocolate fudge, which is typically used as a topping for ice cream

Ice cream

Ice cream or ice-cream is a frozen dessert usually made from dairy products, such as milk and cream, combined with fruits or other ingredients....
, particularly sundae

Sundae

The sundae is an ice cream dessert. It typically consists of a scoop of ice cream topped with sauce or syrup , and in some cases other toppings such as chopped nuts, whipped cream, or maraschino cherry....
s and parfait

Parfait

Parfait is a French language word meaning "perfect." In English language, it has several meanings:* Parfait ** French parfait, Frozen custard made with cream, and usually with a fruit puree...
s. It may also occasionally be topped upon smores.

Chemistry

Fudge is a drier variant of fondant

Fondant

Poured fondant is a cream confection used as a filling or coating for cakes, pastries, and candies or sweets. In its simplest form, it is sugar and water cooked to the Candy#Manufacture, cooled slightly, and stirred or beaten until it is an opaque mass of creamy consistency....
.

In forming a fondant, it is not easy to keep all vibration

Vibration

Vibration refers to mechanical oscillations about an equilibrium point. The oscillations may be periodic function such as the motion of a pendulum or random such as the movement of a tire on a gravel road....
s and seed crystal

Seed crystal

A seed crystal is a small piece of single crystal material from which a large crystal of the same material typically is to be grown. The large crystal can be grown by dipping the seed into a supersaturated solution, into molten material that is then cooled, or by growth on the seed face by passing vapor of the material to be grown over it....
s from causing rapid crystallisation to large crystals. Consequently, milkfat and corn syrup

Corn syrup

Corn syrup is a syrup, made using cornstarch as a feedstock, and composed mainly of glucose. A series of two enzyme reactions are used to convert the cornstarch to corn syrup....
are often added. Corn syrup contains glucose

Glucose

Glucose , a monosaccharide also known as grape sugar, blood sugar, or corn sugar, is a very important carbohydrate in biology....
, fructose

Fructose

Fructose is a simple Reducing sugar sugar found in many foods and is one of the three important dietary monosaccharides along with glucose and galactose....
(monosaccharides) and maltose

Maltose

Maltose, or malt sugar, is a disaccharide formed from two units of glucose joined with an a linkage. It is the second member of an important biochemical series of glucose chains....
(disaccharide). These sugar

Sugar

Sucrose

Sucrose is a disaccharide of glucose and fructose, with the molecular formula C12H22O11. Its systematic name is a-D-glucopyranosyl- -?-D-fructofuranoside ....
molecules. They help prevent premature crystallization by inhibiting sucrose crystal contact. The fat also helps inhibit rapid crystallisation. Controlling the crystallization of the supersaturated sugar solution is the key to smooth fudge. Initiation of crystals before the desired time will result in fudge with fewer, larger sugar grains. The final texture will have a grainy mouthfeel

Mouthfeel

Mouthfeel is a product?s physical and chemical interaction in the mouth. It is a concept used in many areas related to the testing and evaluating of foodstuffs, such as wine-tasting and rheology....
rather than the smooth texture of quality fudge.

One of the most important parts is its texture. The temperature is what separates hard caramel

Caramel

Caramel refers to a range of confectionerys that are beige to dark brown in color and derived from the caramelization of sugar. Caramel is often made when cooking sweets....
from fudge. The higher the peak temperature, the more sugar is dissolved, the more water is evaporated; resulting in a higher sugar to water ratio. Before the availability of cheap and accurate thermometers, cooks would use the ice water test

Candy

Candy, specifically sugar candy, is a confection made from a concentrated solution of sugar in water, to which flavorings and colorants are added....
, also known as the cold water test, to determine the saturation of the candy. Fudge is made at the "soft ball" stage which varies by altitude and ambient humidity from to .

Some recipes call for making fudge with prepared marshmallow

Marshmallow

The Marshmallow is a confection that, in its modern form, typically consists of sugar or corn syrup, water, gelatin that has been softened in hot water, dextrose, and flavorings, whipped to a spongy consistency....
s as the sweetener. This allows the finished confection to use the structure of the marshmallow for support instead of relying on the crystallization of the sucrose. Fudge squares can be substituted for the marshmallows.

Fudge

Origins

Geographical consumption patterns

American fudge

Hot fudge

Chemistry

See also

External links