M. Suzanne Terry

The day after Thanksgiving is one of my favorite days of the year. After the feasting from the previous day, my family is still at my parents’ farm. We don’t go shopping. We don’t go to town to the Treasure Hunt. We play Christmas records, get out Christmas decorations, and make homemade candy.

Some of the candies change from year to year. Mom’s favorite is the Texas Millionaire. Aunt Gale’s favorite is Divinity (blech).

And we always have at least one type of fudge.

When we were little, my sister and I didn’t really like fudge. We weren’t fond of dark chocolate, and we were generally content with store-bought candy. This was unacceptable to my mother, so one year, she made Fantasy Fudge. It’s a light, milk chocolate fudge. I think she got the recipe off the back of the Marshmallow Creme jar. For a long time, it was my favorite.

As our tastes matured, we started to like Mom’s chocolate peanut butter fudge, which is very similar to this recipe. Her use of a variation of this fudge as the frosting to her chocolate cake probably helped us make that transition.

Yes. You read that right. My mom uses fudge to frost her chocolate cake. Go and do likewise, but make sure that you have a nice place to lie down afterward, because you’re going to need it.

Mom is particular about a lot of things, but the process of candy-making takes her pickiness to a whole new level. There is a right size and shape for every candy. There is a right way to pack them. And every year, she reminds me that the fudge has to get to exactly 235 degrees, or it won’t set up, and then we’ll be forced to eat it straight out of the pan with a spoon or slathered on macaroons or vanilla wafers. And wouldn’t that be terrible?

If by “terrible,” one means “glorious,” then yes. Yes, it certainly would.

And that is the beauty of fudge. It’s not difficult to learn to do well, but even if you mess up (assuming you don’t scorch it – that really is terrible), you’ve still got a pan of butter, chocolate, sugar, and cream, so the end result is going to be wonderful, no matter what it looks like.

If I’m making fudge for other people, I’ll make one of the recipes above. They’re both crowd-pleasers.

But if I’m making a special fudge treat just for me, I make it vegan, and I make it pour-able.

This recipe has many uses. It’s good on waffles. It’s good on fruit. And it’s amazing when poured over a chocolate espresso cake.

Vegan Hot Fudge

In a double boiler, whisk together and heat, stirring often:

• 1 cup full-fat coconut milk
• 1/2 cup baking cocoa

When it starts to steam like it’s about to boil, whisk in:

• 4-6 Tbs (to taste) agave nectar (I also have used maple syrup or a simple syrup that I had left over from cocktail night)

At this point, if one were so inclined, one could stop and enjoy it as a nice drinking chocolate. One might also find this to be a pleasant addition to coffee.

But if you’re committed to hot fudge, stir in:

• 1 Tbs coconut oil
• 1 Tbs each of vanilla extract and bourbon (unless you’ve had the foresight to make your own bourbon vanilla. Then just add two tablespoons of that).

If you want a thicker sauce, add a little (1-2 tsp) cornstarch with the cocoa at the beginning.

Remove from heat and pour into a glass jar to cool. I imagine that it will keep in the fridge for about a month, but mine never lasts that long, so don’t hold me to that.

My hot fudge might be a fairly distant cousin of the fudge I grew up with, but it still brings back memories of home, family, and tradition.