A treasured family recipe, Mary’s “Sticky Popcorn“ is the best soft caramel corn recipe ever! It is everything wonderful about homemade caramel popcorn; and despite its nickname, it’s not sticky at all!
Pop popcorn and set aside in an extra-large bowl or roasting pan.
In a medium saucepan over medium heat, combine remaining ingredients.
Stirring constantly, melt butter and heat mixture on medium until it reaches a full, rolling boil. (This is a boil that cannot be stirred down.) Boil 1 minute.
Remove from heat. If you are want to, you can check the temperature with a candy thermometer. It should read 200° F [94° C].Note: This is the first time I have checked the temperature for this caramel, ever. If you don’t have a candy thermometer, no worries! Just boil it for one minute, and you’ll be golden!
Immediately remove from heat and pour over popcorn. Stir popcorn with wooden spoon until popcorn is all coated with caramel.Immediately remove from heat and pour over popcorn. Stir popcorn with wooden spoon until popcorn is all coated with caramel. You need to do this step very quickly!NOTE:My caramel got a little too cool because I was stopping the process to take pictures. If you watch the video, you can see that it is already getting stiff when I’m stirring the caramel in. If you do pour the caramel and stir it right away, without stopping in the middle to take a half a million pictures and video, it will stir in very smoothly.