Well. My wife wants to send smoked almonds to all family members back in Chicago for Christmas. So I received a request to make up a lot of smoked almonds over the next couple weeks. Thought I'd try something that would go with the holidays so I whipped up a test batch of smoked cinnamin pecans instead of the normal almonds (doing those too). Here's the recipe I used, partially provided, partially improvised:
Ingredients:
•3 LBS Raw Pecans
•3/4 C Honey
•1/4 C Apple Juice
•1/4 C Cinnamon Powder
•1/4 C Sugar
Warm the honey in a sauce pan and thin it with the apple juice. Pour mixture over nuts in a large mixing bowl and mix thoroughly. Add mixture of cinnamon and sugar, mix thoroughly. Put mixed nuts on cookie sheets and place in smoker. I used a pouch of hickory pellets and chunk of hickory wood for smoke and cooked them at 210F for about 3 hours, stirring halfway. Don't let temps get too high else the sugar on the nuts will burn. Remove from smoker and let set out on the cookie sheets to cool. Once cooled, break up clusters by hand.
The nuts start out a bit sticky, but thoroughly dry after the smoke and setting out for an hr. They turned out quite good. Slight smoke flavor with a sweet cinnamon taste. So we'll be sending smoked cinnamon pecans and smoked garlic almonds back east for Christmas.
Thought I'd share this with the group in case you're looking for something a little different for the holidays. Makes for a nice gift along with a bottle of wine when attending a friend's holiday party.
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