Watching Miss America was always a yearly thing for me but it wasn’t an ‘event’ until one of my besties confessed a few years ago that she loves pageants – of course out came the champagne and plastic crowns! Since living in the woods for Miss America this year (& last year), I’ve made it an event with Wee One #2, who adores all things pink and girlie and glittery and pretty and omg she’s such a little diva I love it.

We usually have a big spread and make a whole night of it, but she was practicing her embroidery and I had been helping Wee One #1 with homework for a good part of the day – so we settled on popcorn but of course only pink popcorn would do for such a girlie occasion!

I’ve made loads of different caramel corn and I swear this recipe tastes just like the junk at the mall – the junk at the mall that you LOVE!! DON’T LIE TO ME! Ahem. I plan to try this recipe out with drink crystal flavors and different colors!

Old Fashioned Pink Popcorn – from Cooking Classy 2/3 cup unpopped popcorn kernals 2 cups sugar 2/3 cup half & half 1 tbsp light corn syrup 1/4 tsp salt 1 tsp vanilla 6 drops red food coloring / dollop food coloring paste
Pop your popcorn and set aside. In a saucepan, whisk together the sugar, half & half, corn syrup and salt.	Cook this until it bubbles and looks all scary and you’re sure you’ve done something wrong. Use a candy thermometer to be sure your mixture gets to 232F.
This is when you take it off the heat and stir in the vanilla and food coloring. If you’re experimenting with other colors and flavors, switch them up now!	Mix the color in or the popcorn will be streaky.
Pour your neon goo over the popcorn. Mmm. Neon goo.	This works best of you divide all your popped popcorn in half first for easier mixing.
Spread out the shiny, sticky popcorn onto parchment paper and let it dry (if you can stop yourself from picking at it).
This stuff is addicting, so I’m glad I made it for a crowd!