Skip to main content
Dessert

Strawberry Rock

A candy made by boiling sugar, coloring it red and green, and shaping it into a layered rock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
Jump to recipe ↓

Strawberry Rock

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sugar batches

  1. Boil sugar until it reaches the consistency of stick candy.

  2. Pour out two-thirds of the batch onto a slab.

  3. Color the remaining sugar red. Stir the red sugar in the basin.

  4. Pour out the red-colored sugar.

  5. Take three-fourths of a pound of the first batch. Color that portion green.

  6. Pull the remaining sugar until it is perfectly white.

Build the rock

  1. Form one pound of the white sugar into a roll about 4-5 inches long.

  2. Wrap one-third of the red batch around the white roll.

  3. Spin the wrapped roll out to about 5 feet in length.

  4. Cut the rolled candy into 15 pieces, each 4 inches long.

  5. Arrange 5 pieces together, then 4 on top, followed by 3, 2, and 1 to form a triangle.

  6. Form the green sugar into a thin strip about 12 inches long.

  7. Cut the green strip into 3 equal pieces.

  8. Lay 2 pieces flat on the table.

  9. Stand the third piece upright in the middle.

  10. Place a block of white sugar on either side of the upright piece to form a square.

  11. Position this square at the base of the triangle.

  12. Wrap the remaining white sugar around the entire structure.

  13. Form the red sugar into a thin sheet.

  14. Wrap the thin red sheet around the white sugar.

  15. Spin the wrapped candy out like stick candy.

Finish

  1. When cold, cut the candy into small pieces using a knife.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

What each ingredient does

Sugar
Forms the glassy candy structure that sets firm as it cools.
Red food coloring
Colors the sugar red for the strawberry look of the candy.
Green food coloring
Colors a separate portion of sugar green for the leaf-like pieces.

The step that matters

Spin the wrapped roll out to about 5 feet in length. Sugar candy is shaped while warm and pliable; stretching it too cool can crack or tear it, and it must be pulled evenly so the colored layers and pattern stay consistent.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like