Sri Lankan Pol Toffee (Coconut Candy)
My dearest Nandi (aunt) makes the most amazing Sri Lankan Pol Toffee (coconut candy) I've tasted in my life, and I've been a huge fan of this delicious sweet treat since I was a kid. She would make them for me every time we visit her in my dad's village, and tasting Pol toffee for me is pure nostalgia. And now I try to make them every year for my New Year Kiribath (milk rice) table.
Pol (coconut) Toffee is a very popular sweet we make for the Sri Lankan Sinhala and Hindu New Year table, which we celebrate in April. Other than for New Year's, we also make them for other celebrations or auspicious or religious events, such as weddings or alms givings. People make them in different colors, but almost always it's either pink or green. If you go to a Sri Lankan event, and someone serves you a pink-colored candy, that's most probably a Pol Toffee.
Flavor and texture of Pol Toffee (Coconut Candy)
They taste coconutty, sweet, and creamy, with a hint of vanilla. They smell amazing, too, thanks to all the coconut. Texture-wise, I know we call them Pol toffee, but they are not hard like typical toffees at all. Pol Toffee is a little chewy and has a slight crunch to it. I'd say they are somewhat similar to fudge, but not smooth, melty, or creamy.
Tips for Perfect Pol Toffee
- Many Sri Lankan sweets are hard to make. If I had to choose a relatively easier one out of all, I'd probably choose pol toffee. It's probably the easiest Sri Lankan sweet out there, and with some tips and troubleshooting, you can get them perfect.
- Choose fresh coconut, not dessicated coconut. Fresh coconut tastes much better, and I've noticed that when I use dessicated coconut, they tend to have a dry texture. Also, dessicated coconut leaves dry coconut residue in your mouth, and I find that unpleasant. With fresh coconut, it actually melts in your mouth without leaving any dry coconut residue. If you don't have freshly grated coconut, use grated frozen coconut. (This is what I use too)
- Run the coconut in your blender or food processor before you start making pol toffee. You can cut them very neatly this way and I like the texture better too. Do this especially you use machine-grated coconut (such as frozen coconut) since they have much larger pieces than hand-grated coconut.
- Though this is optional, adding a little bit of butter makes the toffees taste richer and softer. Traditional pol toffees are vegan and don't contain any butter. Don't worry, even if you skip adding butter, they are still really delicious.
- Keep the heat and medium to medium-low when you cook the mixture. High heat can make the sugar caramelize and harden.
- Keep stirring the mixture the whole time. This is how you make sure that the whole mixture cooks evenly.
- I usually use a ceramic-coated non-stick wok. This makes it much easier to cook and clean it.
- Keep everything you use coated with butter before you start cooking.
- Most importantly, make sure to take the mixture off the heat at the right time. When you start to cook it, the mixture will become watery as the coconuts release moisture and sugar melts. But when you keep cooking, you'll see that the moisture evaporates and the mixture becomes thicker and thicker. As soon as the mixture starts to clump up together as one large lump, that's your clue to get it out of the heat. As soon as you take it out of the heat, spread it on a buttered pan and cut it into pieces.
- Wait until the toffees are completely cooled down before you separate the pieces and store.
- Make sure to store in an air-tight container. Mine usually last about a week.
Troubleshooting:
The mixture is too soft
If the mixture is too soft and doesn't harden, there's too much moisture in the mixture. You can return it to the pan and slowly heat it up while continuously mixing, until the mixture looks like a soft lump that clumps together. And then spread it on a baking tray and cut it as usual.
The mixture is too hard
Pol Toffees harden as they cool down. So it's important that you don't cook it for too long until the mixture is one large heavy ball that's hard to spread. Also, you need to immediately spread the mixture and cut it into pieces as soon as you take it off the heat. The more you wait, the harder it gets to spread the mixture.
In case the mixture becomes too hard to even spread, don't worry, there is a way to fix that. It's a little too much work, and the texture of pol toffees might turn a little gritty, but I guess it's still a good way to save the mixture than starting over.
You can let the whole mixture cool down, and then break it into pieces (use something heavy) and run it through the food processor/blender until it looks somewhat like dessicated coconut. Then put it back in the pan with a few tablespoons of water and heat it up. You'll see that everything softens as the sugar melts. Keep stirring until the mixture reaches the right consistency, and then spread it on a baking tray and cut it.
Serving Ideas:
I love to make Pol Toffee (Coconut Candy) for Sri Lankan and Hindu New Year, along with Kiribath (milkrice), Lunu Miris or Seeni Sambol, Kokis, Butter Cake, or Pol Cake, Milk toffee, and some other traditional sweets, as time permits.
I also love to make them sometimes, just as a tea-time snack. They go amazingly well with a cup of Ceylon tea or Milk Tea.
They are sweet, coconutty, aromatic, and have the perfect texture. One of my favorite Sri Lankan sweets of all time.
- 200 g Grated Fresh Coconut (200g = 2 cups) (NOT desiccated coconut)
- 300 g White Sugar (300g = 1 1/2 cups)
- 2 tbsp Water
- 2 tsp Unsalted Butter
- 2 pinches Salt
- 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1 drop Pink or Green Coloring
- 1 tbsp Butter to coat the baking tray, spatula and knife
Apply butter on an 8 * 8-inch baking tray, a knife, and the spatula that you're going to use. (You won't be using the whole tray, so if you have a smaller baking tray, that should work too.)
Add the coconut into a food processor and grind it until the coconut pieces are finer in texture (but not a paste). Do not add any water.
This step is optional but you get a better texture in your pol toffees and also they look neater when you cut them.
Into a medium wok (non-stick woks are easier for this), add coconut, sugar, water, salt, and butter. Turn on the heat and set it to medium-low. Mix and cook everything until the coconut starts to release moisture and you see a liquidy mixture that's slowly simmering. (If the mixture is too dry and you see sugar starting to caramelize, add another tablespoon of water and lower the heat. Keep stirring the mixture continuously.
Add vanilla and coloring, mix, and continue stirring the mixture. The mixture should slowly get thicker as you cook it down. Do not increase the heat at any point. Keep it around medium-low to low.
I add coloring halfway though the cooking process and, not at the beginning, because, I notice the color stays brighter, and the vanilla aroma stays better when I do it this way.
When the mixture becomes thick and heavy, clumps together like a paste, and is no longer liquidy, immediately transfer it to the baking pan.
Use a spatula to spread it into a rectangle about 1/2 inch thick
Cut it into 1.5-inch square pieces, but don't separate them, as the mixture is still wet and not set.
The pol toffee pieces will firm up in about 30 minutes. Then carefully separate the pieces and store them in an air-tight container. They can last about 1 week at room temperature.
