Once you try homemade salted caramel sauce, you won’t ever want store bought again! The browned butter gives this sauce an amazingly deep flavor!
Smooth, dreamy, homemade salted caramel sauce is flecked with bits of browned butter for an incredibly deep and nutty flavor. This is one sauce you’ll be putting on absolutely EVERYTHING!
I have a little secret you guys. Some of you may gasp a little, (okay maybe not, but play along)… but I don’t really like caramel. ** awkward pause ** …I know right?! Well at least I THOUGHT I didn’t like caramel. It turns out, I just didn’t like the colored corn syrup sold in jars labeled “caramel sauce” from the grocery store. I made some homemade salted caramel sauce and was BLOWN away. I mean, I think it’s true love you guys.
I literally couldn’t stop eating it. It started off all innocently with a little taste off the spoon, then quickly spiraled into a mad search through the house for things I could put this caramel sauce on. Basically the food was irrelevant, it was just a caramel delivery device lol. I’ve eaten SO many apples (honeycrisp are my favorite), dipped in this sauce… all under the guise of feeling good about myself for eating more fruit (nevermind that it’s coated in a mixture of butter, cream and sugar). Isn’t it funny how our minds work?
If you’ve heard that making homemade salted caramel sauce is complex or difficult, don’t worry… it just takes a little bit of patience and faith, but certainly isn’t hard or too time consuming at all!
Patience and faith my friends… and here’s why.
PATIENCE:
- Browning butter can be a little bit of a longer process, and you can’t really walk away and let it do it’s thing… it needs some babysitting. If you’ve never browned butter before this is a great tutorial.
- When starting the caramel process, you have to cook down sugar in a pan (with no liquid), which is a whole lot of “omg nothing is happening… maybe I’m doing it wrong… how can it take this long to melt sugar?!” to, “oh wait, there it goes”
- Once the sugar starts to melt, it looks like clumps of slightly wet sand, then gradually becomes wetter and wetter, but it does take a while before allllll the sugar clumps are completely dissolved.
- Don’t skip the waiting for them to dissolve though… you want the sauce to be nice and smooth, not grainy.
FAITH:
- Once you add the cream, the sauce will foam and bubble up like some horrible science experiment gone horribly wrong… but fear not!
- Just keep whisking, and take the pan off the heat for a minute if you need to.
- Even if the caramel clumps up on the whisk a bit, just keep whisking (said in my best Dory voice), and it’ll melt off.
- Before long, you’ll have a smooth, rich, glossy sauce.
There are several ways to make caramel sauce, but this is my favorite way. If you prefer a different way, just incorporate the browned butter into your recipe… trust me, you won’t regret it!
My favorites to drizzle with this salted caramel sauce (or dip in it):
This sauce would also be a fantastic gift to give away during the holidays!
Enjoy!
Did you make this? Be sure to leave a review below and tag me @the_chunky_chef on Facebook and Instagram!
Ingredients
- 6 Tbsp butter
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup heavy cream + 2-3 Tbsp
- 1/4 tsp sea salt
Instructions
- Add butter to small sauce pan and heat on MED-LOW.
- Butter will melt, then foam up, then the foam will start to go away. Whisk or swirl the pan frequently.
- Brown flecks (the butter solids) will start to form at the bottom. Once they're golden brown (not dark brown or black), and the butter smells nutty, remove pan from the heat.
- Pour butter into small bowl and set aside to cool.
- Wash pan, then add in sugar.
- Heat over MED heat, and stir often with a rubber spatula.
- After several minutes, the sugar will start to melt into brown liquid and will look clumpy. More and more clumps will appear, then they will start to melt into the brown liquid.
- Make sure all the clumps of sugar have dissolved into the liquid before moving on to the next step.
- Whisk in cooled browned butter.
- Lower heat to LOW and add the cream, while whisking continuously.
- Mixture may foam and bubble up like crazy, but keep whisking (take the pan up off the heat if you need to).
- The bubbling will go down and become a glossy sauce.
- Simmer for 1-3 minutes on MED-LOW heat, whisking often.
- Sauce will thicken as it cools, so if it looks thin, just give it time to cool some.
- Once it cools for a bit, stir in the salt.
- Use right away or store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for a week or so.
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Chef Tips
Cathy says
The sauce came out very smooth and on the dark side. Not a light caramel color. It has a burnt taste to it. What could I have done wrong? The butter was golden and didn’t seem burnt. There was some dark brown sediment in the cooled butter which I pored in along with the butter. Could this have been why? I was so looking forward to this recipe.
Amanda says
It sounds like the butter got a tad too browned and was leaning on the burnt side, which is what led to that burnt taste. Browned butter should taste nutty and rich, not burnt or bitter. Browning butter can be a bit tricky since it can burn SO quickly, so it’s one of those things that take a bit of practice 🙂
Nancy Mackenzie says
To add to my comment below I only use a dash of salt because I don’t care for “salted” deserts.
Nancy Mackenzie says
Excellent and easy. I keep a batch in the frig at all times. Drizzle it on Apple crisp or on basque burnt cheesecake.
Meg says
This caramel sauce is well worth the effort. I had faith and cooked as directed. Unbelievably delish! Love this recipe.
Tina Marie says
Not sure what I did wrong, parts if it clumped up despite my constant whisking. The part that stayed liquified is delicious. I used a silicone covered whisk since I used a non stick sauce pan, maybe that had something to do with it. I did lower temperature after adding butter. I will try it again another time.
Sarah Stribling says
Hello–how much does this recipe yield?
The Chunky Chef says
I believe it’s about 1 1/3 cups.
Rachel in Maine says
This stuff is unbelievable!!! I love caramel, so this is like heaven, may be the best thing I have ever made. I made your apple crisp recipe too, I am sure it is going to be amazing with this sauce. I cut the salt a tiny bit as I don’t like my caramel overly salty. I can’t believe I haven’t ever tried making this before, but maybe I was waiting for your very clear, easy to follow instructions. Thanks so much!
Rachel in Maine says
Would give this ten stars now if I could! It was amazing with the apple crisp, the best dessert I can remember having!!! I bet it would be amazing on apple pie too. Thanks for both recipes, they are great, I am going to try the apple crisp topping on some kind of cherry filling next.
Carol W says
Fantastic sauce – fast & easy. Just need a little patience
Definitely worth the wait ! Yum 😋
Sarah Turner says
Any chance you can use 1/2 and 1/2 instead of cream? I’m guessing no :-/ Thanks!
The Chunky Chef says
I’ve not tested it, but I think it should work just fine 🙂
Sarah Turner says
It did! Delicious! I served it on your Old Fashioned Easy Apple Crisp – YUM!!
Sharon says
Yum!!! Would this work with brown sugar?
The Chunky Chef says
I’ve only tested this recipe as written, so I can’t say for certain, but I think it would.
Vicky says
Easy recipe. Use patience with the butter and sugar and you will reap the rewards! 1000% tastier than store-bought sauce. Thanks for sharing.
Deborah. L. Meyer says
Hi! I just read through your recipes for Apple Crisp and the Caramel sauce. My husband LOVES caramel, sovi Must make it for him. It sounds simply decadent and totally divine. Thanks so much for sharing your recipes.
Liz Frank says
If the salted caramel is slightly bitter does this mean you browned the butter too long? Still love the recipe!
I burned the first batch of butter and made a second batch.
The Chunky Chef says
Yes, you’ll want to pull the pan from the heat a little bit earlier. Also, make sure you’re whisking or swirling the pan frequently 🙂
Heather House says
Do you use salted or unsalted butter?
The Chunky Chef says
I use unsalted since I add the salt, but you could use salted butter and then just use less salt if you prefer.
Meghan Krantz says
Has anyone tried replacing the cream with coconut cream? I’m curious if this would work.
Eric says
I know this is a bit of a late reply but we don’t use heavy cream in South East Asia since they are hard to come by and EXPENSIVE. We use coconut cream instead, coconut milk if you want it thinner. They are cheaper here and delicious. Swap it out. You can omit butter since Coconut Cream is heavy and rich. Great Vegan Option. You’d be surprised! If you want to give it an Additional Asian Twist, add some Pandan Extract instead of Vanilla. You could get them at an Asian Supermarket. Cheers!
Beata says
So I’ve become obsessed with brown butter in baking and just thought omg brown butter caramel! Your recipe was like the only one that I could even find! This caramel came together easily and yes it did require some patience…stir stir stir…but this always happens to me…clumps up when i had the heavy cream (I even let the cream sit out for awhile so it’s not super cold when I add it to the caramel and it still clumps up…but I just keep stirring it until it dissolves) Either way this brown butter caramel is sick! There isn’t an obvious brown butter flavor but there is this addictive quality to it…like you know it’s different and special but you just can’t put your finger on what it is! I used it in a pear pie and it was an absolutely perfect compliment to the subtle sweetness of the pear. Thanks for sharing a killer recipe!