Salted Rum Caramel Bars with Macadamia Shortbread
I had my first caramel bar in Santa Monica, at the café Huckleberry, which my friend Rita and Damon took us to, just a few weeks before we left to go to Hawaii. We loved the café so much that we ended up going to it twice that trip, enamored with their Monte Crisco sandwich. I adored their salted caramel bars, chewy and sweet with just a touch of sea salt to balance it. Once I was out in Hawaii, I knew that I wanted to make a tropical version, with rum and macadamia nuts. My sister and her husband seemed to like them as well, and AJ just adored them (not a surprise as he loves anything caramel). Make sure to use a candy thermometer to bring the caramel to the right temperature. If you don’t, the caramel will be runny and you’ll end up with a sticky (though still tasty) melty mess.
Estimated Nutrition (whole recipe, rough)
Counts 8 of 9 ingredients — the other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and contribute nothing above, so the real totals are higher.
What these numbers assume — 8 portions →
| Ingredient | Portion assumed | kcal |
|---|---|---|
| Flour | 1 cup (125g) all-purpose | 455 |
| Butter | 1 tbsp (14g) | 102 |
| Cream | 1 tbsp (15ml) heavy | 51 |
| Sugar | 1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated | 49 |
| Rum | 1/2 oz (15ml) | 32 |
| Walnut | 1 walnut half (4g) | 26 |
| Vanilla | 1 tsp extract (4ml) | 12 |
| Salt | 1 tsp (6g) | 0 |
| Bean | not in our table | 0 |
Totals for the whole recipe, adding one typical portion per ingredient — listed above. Quantities in the recipe are not counted, so this is a rough guide only — not suitable for medical or dietary planning.
Ingredients
- 225 g (1 1/2 cups) all-purpose unbleached white flour
- 55 g (1/2 cup) confectioners’ sugar
- 170 g (1 1/2 sticks or 3/4 cup) salted butter (if you only have unsalted, add 1 1/2 teaspoons of sea salt) at room temperature
- 80 g (1/2 cup) Macademia nuts, roughly chopped to 1/4” pieces
- 2 cups (1 pint) heavy cream
- 1/4 cup dark rum
- 1 vanilla bean
- 400 g (2 cups) sugar
- 200 g (3/4 cups plus 2 tablespoons or 1 3/4 sticks) unsalted butter
- 2 teaspoons coarse sea salt (do not use table salt, it’s way too harsh)