Nib Sugar

Instructions

1. Heat the oven to 100C (fan 90C) and line a flat baking tray with baking parchment. The oven must stay low: any colour at all and the sugar caramelises instead of drying white.
2. Put 250 g of granulated white sugar in a bowl. Add 45 ml of cold water a little at a time, rubbing it through with your fingertips after each addition, until every grain is damp and the mixture has the texture of wet sand that clumps firmly when squeezed in the fist. It should not be wet enough to pour or to look syrupy at the bottom of the bowl.
3. Tip the damp sugar onto the lined tray and press it out with the back of a spoon or a small palette knife into an even slab about 1 cm thick, compacting it firmly so it holds together as one sheet.