for several years now i've wanted to try my hand at making ribbon candy for x-mas. i've yet to build up the nerve since i've heard it can be quite tricky. has anyone here made ribbon candy and if so, can you give a little information on the making them? thanks!

You can do it with pulled sugar but it would require making several batches of it. Someone else may have a better idea. If not I can give you a general how too. Never tried to make candy ribbons with it.

so are you saying its not typically made with pulled sugar? hmmm, maybe i'm in over my head. i really would like to learn more about this craft, it just seems that not too many people are familair with it so its hard to learn!

Here's a quick thing I found.

Ingredients

3 cups sugar
1 cup light corn syrup
1/4 cup water
6 to 8 drops peppermint oil or cinnamon oil
1/4 teaspoon red paste food coloring
1/4 teaspoon green paste food coloring
2 pairs white cotton work gloves
Method
Butter 3 shallow baking pans; set aside. Butter sides of 3 quart saucepan. In saucepan, combine sugar, corn syrup and water.
Cook over medium high heat to boiling, stirring constantly with wooden spoon to dissolve sugar, about 5 minutes. Avoid splashing mixture on side of pan. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until thermometer registers 280° F, soft crack stage, about 20 minutes. Remove from heat; stir in peppermint or cinnamon oil. Pour about 2/3 of the mixture into a buttered pan.
Pour half of the remaining candy into a warm small saucepan.
Add red coloring to this portion and pour into another buttered pan.
Add green coloring to the remaining portion in the 3 quart saucepan. Pour in remaining buttered pan. Let candy cool slightly, 3 to 5 minutes for larger, uncolored portion, 1 to 2 minutes for smaller, red and green portions. As edges cool, lift and fold edges to center with metal spatula. (If candy is too warm, it will stick to spatula.)
When red and green candy can be rolled into balls with spatula, they are ready for shaping. With gloved hands, pull and twist red candy until light in color, 2 to 3 minutes. Shape into 6 inch rope.
Place in 1 of the buttered pans and keep warm in 200° F oven.
Repeat with green portion. At the same time, have the 2nd person pull uncolored portion until white. Shape into a 6 inch rope. Place white rope in center of one of the buttered baking sheets; place one colored rope on each side of white rope. Press all three ropes together to form a single flat log. Working quickly, have one person stretch one end of striped candy log, lengthwise, working to other end until ribbon narrows to about one inch wide. Have second person immediately follow first person and turn ribbon onto 1 edge and fold accordion style to make ribbon shape; break off in 6 inch lengths. If candy hardens to much, return to oven 3 to 5 minutes to soften.

Note:
It takes 2 people to pull and shape this candy, it hardens very fast.

You can make ribbon candy with a standard pulled sugar recipe. You can choose to add a few drops of flavor, if you like, but it tastes great plain. This is tough to do with a written explanation. It's much better done after seeing a demonstration. This photo may help with the explanation:

http://www.pastryscoop.com/psCourses/images/Tina's-pulled-sugar.jpg

You make a regular batch of the boiled sugar recipe, pour it out and let it cool. You warm it up --in a warming box, if you have one--divide it into several portions and color each portion by kneading/pulling in a few drops of gel/paste color so that you can get the scheme that you desire. You alternate colors side by side, making essentially a wide & thick "block" of striped colors. You then pull the ribbon with one hand while pressing the block to the counter with the palm of the other hand. One person can pull a ribbon about 18-24 inches long without the help of a second person. You need to keep the ribbon fairly thick--pull it relatively cool and hard--if you plan to create the classic "ssssss" shape of ribbon candy. You cut the ribbon with a scissors and a wooden spoon handle makes a great item to use to shape the "sssss". Lay the "ssssss" on it's side to cool completely. You can speed the cooling by blowing cool air on it using a hair dryer on the cool setting.

You can look at the snowman cake photo in my pics and the red/green/white ribbon under him could have just as well been "sssss"d.

Hope this is helpful.
Rae

thank you both sweetart and rae for the recipe and link! i'm slowly but surely building up the nerve to finally attempt making them!

No not saying its not typically made with pulled sugar it can be. Making ribbons with pulled sugar just requires several different batches of different colored sugar unless you can keep the batches separated out of one pouring and your quick enough to turn and pulled each little batch before it begins to harden on you.

Hi all of you
I have found one site on net showing video on how to make ribbon candy,My internet speed is very slow so i cannot attach that video with this post so just click on the following link

http://www.herculescandy.com/page-videos.htm

dailey:hope that answers your question.

Take care bye

Wow, if you try this you definitely have to post some feedback--this sounds like quite an undertaking! It is the prettiest candy, I think. Good luck!

Ribbon candy was a favorite of my grandma's, good luck!