While all penuche is fudge, not all fudge is penuche.
Penuche, or brown sugar fudge, is a fudge candy whose main flavor is brown sugar.
The pecans and cherries make for a delicious bite!
You'll need brown sugar, sugar, butter, half and half, kosher salt, vanilla, toasted pecans, tart dried cherries, and finishing salt for sprinkling on the finished candies.
Stir ingredients (except the mix-ins) together. Heat to 242F/118C. Cool down to at most 130F/54C before stirring until it loses its shine. Stir in mixins and pack into your pan.
Once the candy has reached temperature, add vanilla, but don't stir.When the fudge has cooled to no more than 130F/54C, begin stirring.Eventually, it will lose its shine and begin to thicken.
In this photo, the penuche still needs a bit more stirring, but you can see how it has thickened, is a bit lighter in color, and starting to look matte rather than shiny.
Quickly stir in the mix-ins, scrape it into your prepared pan, and press it evenly into the pan with a pan-sprayed offset spatula. Sprinkle lightly with finishing salt.