Best Candy Thermometer

I feel your pain, I haven't found a decent one lately at all.  I make a lot of confections and caramels, and it's been a nightmare.

I think the one made by Matfer is my next purchase.  I used it at my first pastry job, and it was always reliable.  I'll have to convert all my stuff over to celsius, but no big.  Most of the problems I have is the stem isn't long enough, or they are top heavy and fall over or out of the pot.

The Matfer one has a metal cage around it, and you can get a holder that clips onto the pot and holds it out over the middle.  

I have had the same issues with all reading different temps.  

Believe it or not, I have a mercury thermometer that I purchased at a dollar store that works the best for me. I do a lot of confection work and out of everything that I have ever tried, the cheapest of the lot worked the best.

I can't find a reliable candy thermometer either. I have a digital instant read thermometer that seems to be the most accurate, but if I clip it onto the side of the pan, the steam from the boiling sugar messes up the digital display and all I can read is "8888". To use it I have to intermittently hold it in the middle of the boiling sugar by hand, and it's very uncomfortable. 

 

My dollar store purchase of a mercury-like thermometer broke the first time I used it. (The liquid didn't leak out or anything).

 

I have another digital instant read thermometer with a separate probe that you clip on to the side of the pan, but it's highly inaccurate.

 

This is the one I'm going to try next:

http://www.amazon.com/TCG400-Professional-Candy-Deep-Thermometer/dp/B000095RBW

I use a digital that I bought at Williams Sonoma some years back.  It has been bullet proof to date.  It easily goes from C to F, and has a shield that protects the display from the steam of the pot.