Homemade Gumdrops

Ingredients

• Step 1 - Gelatin Mixture
• 3 envelopes plain gelatin (about 2 Tbsp gelatin powder)
• 1/2 cup cold water
• Step 2 - Sugar Syrup
• 3/4 cup water
• 2 cups sugar
• food coloring
• extracts (I used peppermint, orange, lemon, cinnamon, and vanilla)
• additional sugar for finishing the gumdrops

Directions

1. Prepare the gelatin mixture. Pour the 1/2 cup cold water into a large bowl. Sprinkle evenly with the gelatin and allow to soak while you prepare the sugar syrup.
2. Prepare the sugar syrup by bringing the 3/4 cup water and 2 cups sugar in a saucepan. Bring to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes.
3. Add the hot sugar syrup to the gelatin mixture. (Careful, it's hot!) Stir until the gelatin is completely dissolved.
4. Split the mixture into bowls and color and flavor as desired. I split my batch up into 6 parts. Each used about 4 drops of food coloring and an 1/4 to 1/2 tsp of extract - but extracts vary, so add a little at a time until the desired flavor is achieved.
5. Pour into pans or molds. Chill for several hours or overnight.
6. Remove gumdrops from molds. You will have to really pry them out, but for the most part they will come out whole. (Don't worry, the sugar covers up any little dings.)