You can make this caramelized white chocolate, or liquid gold as it’s been dubbed, yourself. It’s so easy to make! All it takes is a spatula, a cookie sheet, and a little bit stirring. When it’s done you can drizzle this over ice-cream, top brownies with it, and stir into your favorite buttercream to ice a cupcake with. Sky’s the limit for this stuff!

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Ok, tell me I’m not alone. You know when you are melting some white chocolate for oh I don’t know let’s say some cake batter truffles perhaps? Or to make some frosting? And you look away one for second and it seizes up on you into this crystallized chunky white mess. Gah!

And if you are a perfectionist like me you throw the whole bowl into the sink (not to be bothered with at the moment) as you trek out again to get more white chocolate.

You’ve all had this happen right? Tell me I’m not alone. Well apparently some chocolate alchemists at Valhrona waved their magic wand and came up with this, caramelized white chocolate. It’s earning names such as “liquid gold” and “toffee in milk” amongst food bloggers.

And with not so much magic, but heat and time, and not a wand, but your trusty spatula you too can have a bowl of white gold. Ready to be stirred into brownies, drizzled over ice-cream, or (if you are like me with little self-restraint) licked right off the spoon.

What Does Caramelized White Chocolate Taste Like?

What does this little bowl of white gold taste like? Like salted caramel and white chocolate got together (finally, we have all been rooting for them for quite some time!) and decided to call it liquid gold.

It’s got almost a nuttiness to it. A smoothness you would expect from white chocolate. Like a dulce de leche’s cousin. Pure bliss.

Tips For Making Caramelized White Chocolate

Choose your chocolate wisely. Here a couple things I learned while researching white gold and tinkering in the kitchen myself. The percentage of cocoa butter in your white chocolate matters. The higher the content, the more “melty” it will get. So if you are unsure as to what your cocoa butter percentage is, then just watch your chocolate concoction closely. Very closely (like every 5 minutes or so). I wanted to see if I could do this with a bag of white chocolate chips, and found it caramelized just fine.
Pay Attention! This recipe is EASY, it just takes some time, and a close watch. Now this is a project that can take anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour depending on how much chocolate you are caramelizing and what kind of chocolate. So make sure you have blocked out a good chunk of time because you are going to have to stop every five minutes to give this mixture a good stir.
Don’t Throw It Out. If you end up roasting it too long then take the chocolate that has seized up and throw it in a blender. Or you can take the crunchy gold nuggets and toss them in a muffin.

To Make Caramelized White Chocolate

You are going to first start with an oven that is set at a low temperature of 265ºF so that your white chocolate can caramelize and not burn on you. A low temperature is key.

You want to use a non-stick surface. For this, I used my silicone baking mats so that the white chocolate did not stick to the cookie sheet. Parchment paper would work as well.

Simply spread your white chocolate (chips or chopped is fine) onto your mat. And then every five minutes, give it a stir! That’s it!

Now at first, your past memories of tempering chocolate will feel like they are coming back to haunt you. The first five minutes, all seems well. Then the next five minutes happen and it seems all is lost. It’s starting to crystallize and seize up on you. Don’t despair. Just keep stirring and it will smooth out again. I promise. And then from there you will continue this process every five minutes or so until you start to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

What Happens If I Over Roast The White Chocolate?

Now let’s say you were doing great. And you get caught up with the latest (fill in the blank with your favorite TV show you had recorded) and you’ve taken the white chocolate too far. It seizes into crumbles.

If you do over roast the white chocolate and it seizes up on you, don’t despair.

It’s ok. You can eat those too. Throw them into scones, cookies, muffins, whatever suits your fancy. You can also salvage them again by making them smooth again by placing in a blender.

Is White Chocolate Really Chocolate?

According to Bon Appetit, white chocolate is made with a blend of sugar, cocoa butter, milk products, vanilla, and a fatty substance called lecithin. Technically, white chocolate is not a chocolate—and it doesn’t really taste like one—because it doesn’t contain chocolate solids.

I feel like white chocolate is always getting a bad rap. “It’s not really chocolate!”, we’ve heard for years. Ok, ok, we get it. It’s not really chocolate. But hey, let’s embrace what white chocolate can do that it’s more popular cousins, dark and milk, can’t. Let’s give white chocolate another chance.

Let’s make liquid gold with it.

If you are looking for inspiration now of how to use that pot of liquid gold, then check out these roasted white chocolate brownies and roasted white chocolate mousse I whipped up with my liquid gold.

If you like this recipe, let me know and leave me a comment! I love hearing from you!

Until next time, happy baking everyone!