It’s a funny thing, how our food tastes evolve. When I was little, I developed a love for toast and jam. My mom has a knack for placing the triangles of butter just so, in the corners and a dot in the middle, where the result is pillowy pockets of butter hugged by golden brown crunch. Topped with sweet jam of almost any variety (strawberry, apple and raspberry top the list), it’s a love I haven’t outgrown. During my teenage years, it took form as that ready-to-go breakfast sensation, the Pop-Tart. Not nearly as delicious to me as fresh toast, Pop-Tarts were appealing mainly as a go-to vessel for something sweet, be it jam or chocolate. The fact that they’re glazed didn’t hurt, either. In college, I even savored cold Pop-Tarts after long camping trip hikes. So when I recently saw Joanne Chang of Flour Bakery on The Today Show making home-made Pop-Tarts, maybe I didn’t think of it as my carbohydrate + sweet quick-treat maturing into adulthood. That might be a stretch. But I did think that making my own breakfast pastries sounded pretty darn good. Check out the recipe for yourself. A few disclaimers based on my experience: making the dough a day ahead is awesome; rolling it out can be tricky—I found that my Silpat worked best as a surface; DON”T OVER-FILL—I think 2 tablespoons was a bit much for each tart and I will definitely cut back the next time I make these, maybe to 1 tablespoon; if you do over-fill and don’t seal the dough together enough, like me, prepare to mop up jam from your sheet at 5 minute intervals during baking; don’t worry, you’ll get through it, and the leaking jam doesn’t cause the Pop-Tarts to taste any less delicious; USE SPRINKLES, for crying out loud, they’re pretty and yummy. Despite my minor pop-tastrophe with over-filling, I’m totally going to make these again. The pastry is buttery and flaky. There are endless possibilities to fillings. And sprinkles rock. 

John likes sprinkles, too. Well, he likes salt sprinkles better than any rainbow variety. He loved butter from a young age, also. As in, he ate sticks of butter. Luckily, like kids who ate Crayolas and Play-Doh, he grew out of it. But what this habit grew into, I’m convinced, is his love of caramels. Those sticky sweets’ main ingredients are cream and butter. And he must’ve eaten salted butter because salted caramels are John’s favorite. It’s pretty easy and quick to make this treat yourself, as long as you pay careful attention and have a candy thermometer. Try Ina Garten’s Fleur De Sel Caramels. I made a few adjustments: I used a 9 x 9 pan and chose not to roll the caramels. I cut them directly into squares instead—by turning the 9 x 9 pan out onto a cutting board, cutting the square in half and then into smaller squares. I also chose not to individually wrap the caramels, but to store them in a single layer in an air tight container in the fridge. Last, I didn’t have any fleur de sel on hand, so I ground up kosher salt in my mortar and pestle for a finer texture and that worked just fine. It’s really up to your tastes, so you can get creative with the salts. I tried Bella Cucina’s Tuscan Rose & Pink Peppercorn salt to tasty effect as well. I’ll never outgrow a good sprinkle.

If you don’t feel like getting in the kitchen yourself…
Find locally homemade Pop-Tarts by Atlanta’s Red Queen Tarts
Find locally handmade caramels (salted or chocolatey) by Atlanta’s Cacao