The Easiest Way To Clean The Sugar Off Your Candy Thermometer

If you've ever made candy at home you know that a good thermometer is indispensable. Whether you're making nougat, gummies, or a simple caramel sauce from scratch, you need to measure exactly how hot your sugar is to achieve the perfect consistency. But if you've worked with sugar at home, you also know that clean up is the pits. Caramel can set up on your pans, spoons, and — yes, your thermometer. But there's a simple way to clean hardened sugar off your kitchen tools, and it involves nothing more than boiling water.

Luckily, the hardest caramel will liquify under the right conditions. If you've got a hard, crusty sugar residue on your thermometer you can simply boil it off in a pot of water. If you're using a candy thermometer, these will clip onto the side of the pot in which you made your candy. You can kill two birds with one stone by simply leaving the thermometer attached to the dirty pot, and filling the pot with water (being sure to submerge the thermometer) to remove the hardened, sticky sugar from both.

Not all kitchen thermometers are the same; a regular candy thermometer not only attaches to the side of the pot you're using but will often have guides written between temperatures to tell you where your sugar consistency stands. If you're using a basic kitchen thermometer, it usually has a simple probe. This is normally used to stick into meat or baked goods while still making the gauge available to view — and honestly, this makes cleaning a whole lot simpler. 

If you're using a probing thermometer, you can use the same basic idea to clean hardened sugar off. If running the probe under hot water doesn't get the residue off, simply boil water and place the thermometer probe in it for a minute or two. It's important to do this immediately after using, so that the sugar doesn't have time to set up further. Also, you can't usually submerge a digital thermometer in water, so you'll have to hold it. But this also means it gets less messy when you're boiling the sugar. It's absolutely worth using a thermometer in the kitchen for all manner of things, so if you're not already the owner of one you may want to reconsider.