Name: Caramel Potato Chip Fudge Recipe
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 10 min 5 s
Total time: 40 min 5 s
Yield: 32
Ingredients: 3 cups melting chocolate or chocolate chips; 14-oz can sweetened condensed milk; 11-ounce Kraft caramels, unwrapped; 2 tbsp water; 2-3 cups kettle cooked potato chips, crumbled; 1/2 teaspoon sea salt

Caramel Potato Chip Fudge

This Caramel Potato Chip Fudge combines dark chocolate, gooey caramel, and potato chips to make a delicious sweet & salty, irresistible fudge. This fudge recipe uses a shortcut fudge base, which means there’s no need for a thermometer or endless babysitting at the stove! If you’re a sweet-and-salty fanatic like me, this one is going to land right up there with my favorite salted caramel fudge as a go-to treat.

This fudge is delicious, but it’s not one I’d recommend for making-ahead and freezing, because the chips will get stale. Be sure to keep the fudge at room temperature and in an airtight container after making it.

What Is “Shortcut Fudge?”

Can we talk about how much I love a good shortcut? Shortcut fudge is basically the fairy godmother of the candy world. Here’s the deal:

It follows the basic recipe of mixing sweetened condensed milk with melted chocolate, requires no boiling and no candy thermometer, and is endlessly versatile with a million flavor combinations — think watermelon fudge, graham cracker swirls, or even chocolate cookie swirl if you’re feeling extra.

Most of my fudge recipes use this shortcut fudge base. It’s so quick and easy, and the texture always turns out perfectly smooth and creamy.

It’s not that I don’t love traditional fudge, the kind simmered low and slow with a double boiler and watched like a hawk. I’ll admit that nothing compares to traditional, stovetop homemade fudge! In fact, my great-grandma’s Homemade Chocolate Bit Fudge is my all-time favorite fudge recipe. But a dependable shortcut recipe, like this one, is great to have in your back pocket for a rainy day.

Caramel Potato Chip Fudge Ingredients

Have you ever made this Pralines & Cream Fudge Recipe? If you haven’t, you really should—it’s amazing. This fudge recipe has very similar ingredients and follows the same general pattern as the Pralines & Cream Fudge recipe.

✓ Sweetened Condensed Milk: A 14-ounce can of sweetened condensed milk serves as the foundation for the texture and consistency of the fudge. I really like working with sweetened condensed milk, because it’s incredibly versatile and very forgiving.

✓ Chocolate: You can use normal chocolate chips to make this fudge — milk chocolate, dark chocolate chips, or even white chocolate all work beautifully depending on your mood. But I’ve found a lot of success in using Ghirardelli Candy Melts instead. I like the consistency of the fudge better (it’s silky smooth), and it firms up quickly without refrigeration. Which is important for this recipe, because any kind of chilling will accelerate the absorption of moisture into the potato chips (they will taste stale faster).

So if you have access to Ghirardelli candy melts (Amazon, Target, Walmart), I strongly recommend using them as the chocolate in this recipe! Once melted, that glossy chocolate mixture looks almost like a homemade chocolate ganache, and it swirls into the caramel just as dreamily.

✓ Caramel: I took another shortcut and used store-bought caramels to make the caramel sauce for this fudge. But absolutely feel free to make your own sauce! This is my go-to recipe for really smooth and luscious homemade caramel sauce. Either way, you’ll get those gorgeous caramel swirls running through every single bite.

✓ Kettle Cooked Potato Chips: Ok, this part is important. Are you listening? Kettle. Cooked. Potato. Chips. Kettle cooked crinkle chips are even better. But if you can’t find those, just stick with the regular kettle cooked potato chips. These crunchy potato chips are thicker and crunchier than your regular, run-of-the-mill potato chips, which means it will take longer for the moisture from the chocolate and caramel to penetrate them and make them soggy.

Since there are so few ingredients, each one has a crucial role. So be careful if you choose to make any substitutions!

How to Make Caramel Potato Chip Fudge

If you can turn on the stove, you can make this caramel potato chip fudge.

1 | Prepare an 8×8 baking dish by lightly misting with nonstick cooking spray and lining with parchment paper. (Some people swear by wax paper here, but I always reach for parchment paper since it won’t stick to the fudge once it sets.)

2 | Place the caramels in a microwave safe bowl and toss with 2 tablespoons of water. Microwave for 1 minute. Stir until smooth. Heat for another 30 seconds if needed. Set aside. If you’d rather skip the microwave entirely, melting the caramels in a double boiler works great too — just keep the heat low and stir often.

3 | In a medium saucepan, melt together the chocolate and sweetened condensed milk over LOW heat. Stir constantly until smooth.

4 | Spread the chocolate mixture in the prepared baking dish.

5 | Pour the caramel over top of the chocolate. Sprinkle 1 1/2 c. of the crushed potato chips over the caramel.

6 | Use a knife or skinny rubber spatula (like a jar scraper) to swirl the chocolate, caramel, and potato chip pieces. Sprinkle remaining potato chips and sea salt over top.

7 | Let cool at room temperature for at least 4 hours or overnight.

Serving Ideas Beyond The Fudge Dish

Ok, hear me out. This fudge is ah-mazing on its own, straight out of the pan, no questions asked. But if you want to get a little extra (and honestly, who doesn’t?), try crumbling a piece over a big bowl of vanilla ice cream. The warm caramel sauce melts right into the cold cream and it is *chef’s kiss*. I’ve also been known to drizzle extra caramel sauce over chocolate ice cream and peanut butter ice creams and toss a few broken fudge pieces on top — basically turning this into one of those decadent caramel ice creams sundaes you’d pay way too much for at a fancy ice cream shop. A splash of heavy cream whipped up fresh makes the whole thing feel extra special, too. I literally can’t even with how good that combo is.

Tips, Tricks, And Swaps

If you want to riff on this recipe (and I always encourage riffing!), there’s so much room to play. Swap in graham cracker swirls instead of potato chips for a s’mores-adjacent situation, or fold in a scoop of edible cookie dough for extra gooey pockets throughout. You could even melt your chocolate into a glossy chocolate ganache instead of the usual chocolate mixture base for an even richer bite. The sweet-and-salty formula here is basically fool proof, so don’t be afraid to experiment a little — that’s half the fun of a shortcut fudge recipe like this one.

More Fudge Recipes

If this caramel and potato chip combo has you craving more sweet-and-salty magic, don’t stop here! You’ll also love this Chocolate Potato Chip Brownies recipe for your next picnic, or my Cookie Monster Fudge if you’re baking for the kids. And if caramel is truly your love language, go check out my Salted Caramel Brownies and Edges Only Caramel Filled Brownies next — be still my heart, I could eat my way through all of these in one sitting.

Oh, and one more thing — if you make this fudge, snap a pic and tag me! I always love seeing your gorgeous creations. Pop your email address into the subscribe box below so you never miss a new fudge recipe (or really, any recipe) from me. And as always, check out our terms of use if you want to share or repost any of my photos or recipes. Now go make this fudge — you absolutely have to make this one happen in your kitchen soon!

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Caramel Potato Chip Fudge Recipe

Yield: 32 pieces

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 10 minutes 5 seconds

Total Time: 40 minutes 5 seconds

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This caramel potato chip fudge combines dark chocolate, gooey caramel, and potato chips to make a delicious sweet & salty, irresistible fudge.

Ingredients

3 cups melting chocolate or chocolate chips
14-oz can sweetened condensed milk
11-ounce Kraft caramels, unwrapped
2 tbsp water
2-3 cups kettle cooked potato chips, crumbled
1/2 teaspoon sea salt

Instructions

1 | Prepare an 8x8 baking dish by lightly misting with nonstick cooking spray and lining with parchment paper.

2 | Place the caramels in a microwave safe bowl and toss with 2 tablespoons of water. Microwave for 1 minute. Stir until smooth. Heat for another 30 seconds if needed. Set aside.