The “thread” stage of candy is those varieties cooked to no more than 234º. Little rounds of soft dinner mints are included in this group of candies.

The “soft ball” stage of candy is cooked to no more than 240º and includes pillow-soft gems like pralines and marshmallows.

The “firm ball” stage goes up in temperature to 248º and counts caramels and nougats as two of the more famous varieties.

The “hard ball” stage heats to 266º and moves into the realm of the most popular candies like saltwater taffy and festive popcorn balls.

The “soft-crack” stage moves up to 290º and this is the stage where we enter into the crunches and toffees of the candy world.

The “hard-crack” stage is the heavyweight class of candy that cooks upwards of 290º and up to 310º. One of the tough as nails candies that resides in this category is the classic peanut brittle.

Along with the temperature of the cooking candy in the pot, some holiday bakers believe that the weather plays an integral role in the success of the finished candy product. My Grandmother never made fudge on a rainy day. In fact, she never made any type of Christmas candy on a rainy day. No fudge, no divinity, no penuche, no caramel fondant, and no soft pastel after-dinner mints. Not a one was made on a rainy day. Snow, sleet, ice or sun passed the weather muster with Grandmother for candy making, just no rain. Not even a drop. If it rained, the jar of corn syrup was kept in the cupboard.

Grandmother felt that rain added too much moisture to the air, which didn’t allow for the sugar to properly melt during the cooking process. If the sugar didn’t melt just right, she would be left with grainy fudge and that would have been a total embarassment. Grandma could never, ever show her face in town if she served the neighbors grainy fudge.

Grandmother lived on a ranch in the small Central Oregon town of Prineville. This was long before the days when one ordered peanut brittle made in Texas over the Internet, then had Federal Express fly it out from Memphis and deliver it to the farm next door. In more naïve times, people gave neighbors holiday gifts that were made by hand; often candy, cookies or preserves.

Try as I did for years and years, I could never make the grade when it came to making fudge as good as Grandmother’s. My fudge was grainy, regardless of the weather on the day I made it, whether I used pure Hawaiian cane sugar, baker’s sugar or generic brand, a copper pot, a non-stick one or a cheap aluminum saucepan -- nothing I used made a great batch of fudge. I just couldn’t make my fudge taste as creamy, chocolatey and fudgy as Grandmother’s.

I did cheat for a few years. Rather than make fudge the old-fashioned way -- meaning lots of elbow grease to constantly stir the fudge until it is absolutely the perfect consistency and right temperature -- I “fudged” so to speak, and used the recipe on the back of a jar of marshmallow crème.

My Mother warned me that while this would produce a smooth fudge, it would be akin to defaming Grandmother’s candy legacy by taking the low-road shortcut and using marshmallow crème.

Grandmother Ross gave equal opportunity to six the basic categories of candy making during the holidays. The result was a towering silver candy dish of six tiers of sugary sweets, each level giving homage to the Gods of Christmas Candy.

Personally, I like any candy, regardless of the weather on the day it was made or the technical name associated with it based on the temperature at which the candy was cooked.

While fudge is a personal favorite, since I can’t make it like Grandmother did or cause disruption in the family by opening a can of marshmallow crème, I prefer to buy fudge at Christmas. I don’t at all feel guilty in buying fudge for the holidays since I am having a religious experience in doing so.

You see, I buy fudge made by Brigitttine Monks who, in addition to leading a spartan life of hours of daily prayer, make hundreds of pounds of fudge each holiday season in the kitchens of the Trappist Abbey outside of the small Western Oregon town of Amity. I celebrate the true meaning of Christmas while eating my fudge.

My second most-favorite holiday candy is (drumroll please) chocolate covered cherries. Home-made chocolate-covered cherries would take oodles of cherries and untold hours of hand-labor to produce just a few little candies, so no, I do not make them myself. I buy box after box of chocolate-covered cherries and start eating the little buggers the day after Thanksgiving and don’t stop until well into the New Year. At that point I throw the last empty box into the trash and don’t consider eating another chocolate-covered cherry for the next 11 months or so.

My chocolate-covered cherries must be coated in milk chocolate covering a cherry that is swimming in a liquid center with a thick, white cream base. And I don’t buy Godiva or ‘artisanal hand-made’ chocolate covered Bing cherries that cost $5.00 apiece. For my taste, the best chocolate covered cherries come 12 to a box and are sold in literally any supermarket in the country, usually 2 boxes for $3.00.

For homemade candy this time of year, I limit my candy-making to just one class of candy, those in the “hard-crack” category, the big, bad, crunchy, tooth-splitting stuff made from cooked butter and sugar.

“Hard-crack” candies are some of the easiest to make because they require just a few ingredients. In addition to butter, (no margarine during the holidays please), and sugar, hard-crack candies might have a little water, corn syrup or vanilla extract added to the candy base, but that’s about it, save for a few added adornments of nuts or chocolate.

You do not need an expensive French-made, hand-tooled copper pot in order to make good hard-crack candies. While some candy-makers believe that sugar melts better in a copper pot, the real trick to keeping granules of sugar from clinging to the side of the pot during cooking is to stir. Stir, stir, and stir.

Start stirring your candy with a metal wire whisk to dissolve the sugar in the butter. Once the sugar is completely melted, switch to a heavy wooden spoon and continue to stir. I find that stirring some of the bubbling candy up against the sides of the pot help to melt down any of those pesky granules that don’t want to comply and be a part of the candy orgy going on in the center of the pot.

It is crucial to pour the hot candy mixture out onto a cookie sheet or sheet of parchment paper immediately at the precise moment the candy hits the intended temperature. Failure to do so and your wooden spoon will forever be embedded in a concrete candy tomb in the pot.

Don’t forget to wear two heavy oven mitts or some heat-resistant gloves. Hot, bubbling sugar can burn to the bone. At this point you need to work very fast, spreading the hot candy onto the parchment paper into a layer as thin as you can make it. If you wait even a few seconds before spreading the candy, it will harden to a point where no one, certainly not anyone with dentures, will be able to chew through a two-inch thick piece of the rock-like result.

Once hard-crack candies have reached the right temperature, nuts are often added. The final garnish, if you will, for a hard-crack candy, might be a layer of melted milk chocolate and a final dusting of chopped nuts.

Hard-crack candies take less than one hour to morph from a pot of simmering sugar and butter to a beautiful gold nugget of almond bark.