Homemade Salted Caramel Sauce

A jar of salted caramel sauce with a spoon.

5 from 3 votes

Homemade Salted Caramel Sauce

Homemade Salted Caramel Sauce is a simple five-ingredient recipe combining water, granulated sugar, heavy cream, butter, and sea salt. This caramel sauce has fantastic flavor and is perfect over cake, muffins, cheesecakes, ice cream, and so many other things!

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Keyword 5-Ingredient Caramel Sauce, salted caramel sauce

Prep Time 5

Cook Time 5

Total Time 10

Servings Tablespoons

Calories 198kcal

Author Sue Ringsdorf

Ingredients

1/4 cup water - room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup heavy cream - room temperature
1/4 cup unsalted butter - room temperature
1 teaspoon sea salt

Instructions

**ALL INGREDIENTS MUST BE AT ROOM TEMPERATURE!
Cook water and sugar. In a small saucepan, heat the water and sugar over medium heat. Stir constantly until the sugar has dissolved. Turn up the heat, bring the mixture to a boil, and stop stirring. Let the mixture continue to boil until it turns amber in color. This could take several minutes.
1/4 cup water, 1 cup granulated sugar
Add remaining ingredients. Remove pan from the heat and slowly (and carefully!) whisk in the (ROOM TEMPERATURE) heavy cream, whisking or stirring the entire time. Then mix the butter into mixture and add the sea salt. Stir well.
1/2 cup heavy cream, 1/4 cup unsalted butter, 1 teaspoon sea salt
Serve. Pour the sauce into a mason jar and drizzle it on all the things.
Store. Store the caramel sauce in the refrigerator for up to two weeks. You may need to microwave it slightly as it will thicken over time.

Notes

Use a heavy bottom pan that has a little extra surface area. This is a small recipe but having a larger pan than you need is important for proper cooking.
Use ROOM TEMPERATURE ingredients. You can even warm up the heavy cream a bit if you're short on time.
Make sure you let the sugar and water turn amber (see photos above) before removing from heat and adding remaining ingredients. DON'T STIR during this process.
Add the heavy cream in SLOWLY and whisk or stir constantly.
If the sugar starts to clump up, add a bit more water and continue stirring.
If you sugar clumps and you can't get it all to dissolve, it's ok. Simply discard that clump and use the remaining caramel. It's happened to me and it's still delicious!

Store the caramel sauce in the refrigerator for up to two weeks. You may need to microwave it slightly as it will thicken over time.

Nutrition