Rhys Heenan’s

Candied Pecans

What a grand and intoxicating recipe! This is a fun thing to make for the holiday season, but they’re good any time of year. These candied pecans make my dad do the thing where he has a handful of pecans and he shakes them in his fist before popping one in his mouth. These are probably paleo.

Ingredients

  • 3–3½ cups raw whole pecans
  • 2 egg whites
  • ¼ cup coconut sugar (could use brown sugar. I’ve never done it with brown sugar but I don’t know why you couldn’t)
  • 2 tablespoons good maple syrup
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon salt

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 250 degrees F with the oven rack in the middle. Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper, and get a second piece of parchment paper the same size as the first one ready.
  2. In a medium mixing bowl, combine the egg whites, coconut sugar, maple syrup, cinnamon, and salt. Whisk to combine. Add in the nuts, and toss until they’re evenly coated.
  3. Spread the nuts (...) in an even layer on the baking sheet, and try to arrange them so they’re not touching, but it doesn’t have to be perfect. Optional: When you dump out the pecans onto the baking sheet, there might be some leftover egg white mixture in the bottom of the bowl. I toss in some more pecans, stir them in the egg white mixture, and then put it on the tray. Maximize your candied nut acquisition.
  4. Bake for 1 hour, but at the halfway point, unstick the pecans from the parchment paper, transfer to new parchment paper, and continue baking on the rimmed baking sheet. This makes it so the pecans get flipped and the parchment paper doesn’t get too sticky.
  5. Remove from the oven and cool completely. When the pecans come out of the oven, they might seem kind of soft, but as they cool, they’ll get crunchy.

I eat these alone, but these are really good in salads, on ice cream, and in any recipe that needs pecans, really.