Recipe - POPCORN BALLS

Tomorrow Caralie has preschool so we made "orange" popcorn balls to share with her class. Well, they were supposed to be orange but turned out kinda peachy hued.


POPCORN BALLS

5 quarts popped popcorn
3/4 cup light corn syrup
1/4 cup margarine or butter
2 tsp. cold water
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
2 5/8 cups powdered sugar
1 cup marshmallows
food coloring (optional)

Here's what I do: I use my air popper and a large bowl. A quart of popcorn is 4 cups. Typically a 1/4 cup of kernels will yield 4 cups of popped popcorn. As the popcorn falls into the bowl, I scoop it loosely with my fingers (to remove un-popped, tooth cracking kernels) and place the popcorn in my 4-cup Pyrex measuring cup. Then I dump that into my large roasting pan. Once I have all 5 quarts, I put the roasting pan in the oven on "warm."


In a saucepan over medium heat, combine the corn syrup, butter, cold water, vanilla, powdered sugar, and marshmallows. Heat and stir until the mixture comes to a boil (stir in food coloring, if desired).

Take roasting pan out of the oven (use mitts!) and pour syrup mixture over popcorn. Stir until every kernel is coated.

Spray a 1-cup measuring cup and your hands with cooking spray. Fill measuring cup with coated popcorn (mine were heaping cup-fulls). Remove from cup and firmly press to form a ball. (This way, they are all the same size). Place on waxed paper to cool. Repeat (adding cooking spray as needed). Makes 15 - 20 popcorn balls, depending on size.


We put our popcorn balls in cellophane bags with twist-ties and pumpkin tags. You could also use sandwich-size Ziploc bags.

And the last (and best) step:

EAT!!!