Caramel Corn*

INGREDIENTS:

1/2 teaspoon SALT
1 cup BUTTER
2 cups BROWN SUGAR
1/2 cup light CORN SYRUP
...
1/2 teaspoon BAKING SODA
...
5 quarts POPPED POPCORN

DIRECTIONS:

Pop corn until you have 5 quarts of popped corn.  Put into a large bowl, and set aside.

1. Put salt, butter, brown sugar, and corn syrup into a heavy-bottomed pot, and stir constantly.  Bring to a boil over MEDIUM heat--  then, continue to boil (a "boil" that can't be stirred down) for only 2 minutes.  While all of this is happening, just keep stirring all the while and make sure nothing is sticking/burning on the bottom of your pan. (Be careful-- this mixture is so very hot!!!)
2.  Remove from heat and stir in the baking soda which will cause it to change color a little and foam up. 
3. After the baking soda is stirred in, pour the very hot mixture over popped popcorn and GENTLY mix --lifting from the bottom and coming up through the kernels until popped kernels are well coated.  (Vigorous mixing would break the fragile kernels up too much.)   
4. Put coated popcorn on a large baking sheet (about 16-inch by 11-inch?) that was ever so LIGHTLY sprayed with non-stick spray.  

Below:  Because I made a double batch, I had two pans...

5.  Bake in a pre-heated 250-degree oven for 1 hour, but you must gently lift/stir it (to sort of separate the "clumps") EVERY 15 minutes.

6.  At the end of 1 hour, remove from the oven; stir for the last time and let the caramel corn cool in the pans. 

7.  When cool, dump into a large bowl and gently break up the largest clusters before putting into whatever kind of containers you choose.

*Recipe from Smurawa's Country Bakery in Pulaski, WI, and you can find them right here: http://www.smurawabakery.com/

Can you imagine ANY small-town bakery selling 20,000 Paczkis on "Fat Tuesday" like they did last year?  Well, check this out:  http://www.smurawabakery.com/paczki-day    (Oh, those "Polish things" are SO GOOD!!!!)