Love Child of Summer and Fall: Salted Peach Caramel Sauce

The sweet sweet love child of summer and fall has been born and its name is Salted Peach Caramel Sauce.

More from Culturess

As we near fall, we edge closer and closer to the sad bidding adieu to peach season. A couple weeks ago while preparing to cook an 8 course peach based meal, I encountered a recipe with the idea for the ultimate love child of summer and fall, Salted Peach Caramel Sauce.

I’m a big fan of all seasonal produce, but peaches hold a special place in my stomach and heart. I grew up in the St. Louis area and sometimes during summer we would make the pilgrimage to Eckert’s Farms for pick your own peaches. As a kid, I remember those tree-ripened peaches. They were enormous rosy orange fuzzy globes practically the size of my head with irresistibly sweet, fragrant peachiness inside.

Not only did we get to ride a tractor pulled cart to the picking area, but at the end of the ride I’d stumble out and stuff my face with the embodiment of sunshine before helping my parents fill our bags. I think about those lucky, happy memories every time I smell peaches at the farmers market or even the grocery store. Needless to say, I love peaches.

Salted Peach Caramel Sauce. Words can hardly do justice to the velvety smooth texture that reveals a complex dance of warm fruitiness, slightly bitter sweetness, and touch of creaminess punctuated by enough salt to notice the balance it provides. You probably think I’m being overly dramatic waxing poetic about this stuff, but if you try this recipe, you’ll be sighing dreamily over the sauce too.

Salted Peach Caramel Sauce
Adapted from Sunset
Makes approximately 2 cups

Ingredients
2 medium-sized peaches, ripened until soft and fragrant
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon almond extract
½ teaspoon sea salt, more to taste
¼ cup heavy cream

Peel the peaches, remove pits, and slice into smaller pieces. Use an immersion or regular blender to purée until smooth. If you don’t have a blender try to mash it as finely as possible. There should be about 1 cup of peach purée. Set aside. Note: Frozen peaches would work for this step when they’re out of season.
If you’re already accustomed to making caramel, make caramel from the cup of sugar and move on to step 3. Put the sugar in a medium-sized frying pan (mine is a 10″ frying pan) and add 2 tablespoons of water. Cook over medium heat and swirl the contents to try to get any remaining dry sugar to be wet by the bit of water. The liquid mixture will start to boil, keep swirling the contents of the pan occasionally to help distribute the heat. More water will evaporate and it will look like weird crusty snow, this is fine. After a few minutes longer, you’ll notice that some sugar under that crusty stuff will have started to get hot enough to melt and will be visible when you swirl. Keep up with the occasional swirling to help all the sugar melt, during this stage your sugar will start to caramelize and take on some color. Keep cooking until it’s a medium brown; do not leave it alone toward the end, once it starts caramelizing the deepening of color to burnt can be quicker than you think. If there are still little bits of crusty white sugar, don’t worry about it because it’s a sauce: everything will be dissolved in the next step.
Note: Whatever you do, don’t taste any because sugar caramelizes at about 340°F (boiling water is 212°F) and you need those taste buds for enjoying the final product.
Turn off the heat and stir in the peach purée. It will do a little angry spluttering and there will probably be lumps. After you’ve stirred it in as well as you can, turn the heat on at medium-low and cook to melt the lumps.
Stir in the butter, almond extract, salt, and heavy cream. Add more salt to taste. You’re aiming to cut through the sweetness with the salt and give it that wow factor. I used a total of ¾ teaspoon coarse salt. It depends on what type of salt you use and your taste buds. If you are so inclined, a dash of bourbon or other peach-friendly liquor would make for an adult touch.
Then restrain yourself from slurping it with a spoon like soup. Save some to have with ice cream or yogurt, in a milkshake, or drizzled over baked goods like doughnuts. Let cool completely and keep covered in the fridge. It should still be pourable straight from the fridge, but you can rewarm slightly for a more thin drizzling stream. The sauce keeps for at least a week if you don’t eat it all the first day.