I often confuse myself trying to keep toffee and caramel straight. In the U.S. toffee is brittle and caramel is sticky. In the U.K., what we call caramel they call toffee. And what we call toffee… that I don’t have an answer for.
At any rate, Chow.com has a nice description of the differences between toffee and caramel, at least in the U.S. sense of the word. As I write this post (Oct. 8), my question on the site (What about what the Brits call toffee?) remains unanswered.
i’m british. we have caramel here too you know. not the same as toffee at all. toffee is quite hard and really really chewy. I think you can get soft toffee too but that’s really rare. (I tried to buy some recently for a muffin recipe and couldnt find it anywhere.)
you know the toffee in the picture is british don’t you. doesnt look very runny and sticky to me! thats the stuff they give you a hammer for.