My Caramel Recipe with a dash of "just wing it"

I prefer to make homemade caramel for dipping, I realize it's a tad more involved than store bought options but I'll be honest, stirring a boiling hot pot of bubbly caramel really makes me happy (oh, and too preoccupied to notice which child is having a Wii meltdown!) But, trust me I do not frown upon the Peter's brick buyers or the "unwrappers" of individual caramel cubes.
With that being said, I do get a lot of requests for my caramel recipe and getting out of my head and into written form has taken a bit, so here ya go, finally:

Robyn's Caramel Recipe

Author: Robyn Baird - Chocolate Workshop
Recipe type: Dessert
Covers 12 Large apples 
Cook Time: 45 minutes - 1 hour

Ingredients
    
     1 Pint of cream
     2 Sticks of butter
     3 Cups of sugar
     1 Cup of light corn syrup
     1 Can sweetened condensed milk ((14oz))
     1-ish*  tsp  vanilla (*add your favorite small unit of measurement here) dash, nip, smidge, splash. 


InstructionsCombine the first five ingredients in a heavy-bottomed pot over medium heat and stir constantly until boiling. Once boiling, turn down heat to med/low and continue to boil. Occasionally stir gently to check that it is not scalding. Careful not to over stir! Wash down the sides inside pot with a wet brush to dissolve every last sugar granule. Use a candy thermometer to check temperature and remove from heat at soft ball stage or your desired temp (all stoves/heat vary but my temps hover around 230-240*F, if you need that in Celsius, you're on your own!). Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Let it set for a couple minutes then start to dip apples. You can also pour this out into a prepared pan and cut in to bite size pieces when it cools entirely.   I like to cook caramel to a little softer consistency suitable for dipping apples. For the best results don't rely solely on candy thermometers but rather a combination including a cold water test to check your desired consistency.

• When the caramel mixture starts to boil it will bubble up quite a bit. So it's important to make sure you start with a large pot.

• Over stirring and agitation can make your caramel grainy.

• Stray granules of sugar that are left on the sides of the pot can mix into your perfectly smooth caramel and reform the molecular chains making your caramel grainy. For more info on this Alton Brown can give you all the grainy details.

• Extra humidity in the air can affect your caramel.

• Be careful, caramel is VERY hot!