Why did the sugar burn?

[TheOneWithTheHair]

I've just made marmalade for the first time, eek!!

I think it's gone well apart from some of the sugar burnt and I've had to lose some of it. Any idea why this happened?

Not enough liquid? Did you keep on boiling past the setting point?

It could be both those but I think it may be the latter.

My thermometer didn't reach 104.5 but it looked ready and so I turned it off as I was starting to smell the sugar.

Have you any tips for future attempts.

And thank you for your reply.

IME Boiling sugar keeps going for quite a while after turning the heat off. If you make a simple syrup you can actually see it carry on darkening in colour. So I tend to go by timing, appearance and the 'wrinkly drop on a cold saucer' test rather than using a thermometer. Once the time in the recipe is up I start testing and repeat the test every few minutes. Rationale ... I can always boil it more if it's not setting but I can't 'unboil' if it's gone over. Good luck

Ok. I understand that. It makes sense. Next time I'll try it by the saucer test. Thanks. :)