Homemade Treats – Puppy Chow and Cracker Candy

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It is OK to have sweets– if they are homemade. When we make things at home, the first ingredient is NOT high fructose corn syrup, it’s good old-fashioned sugar! We can use whole wheat flour instead of white, etc. and that is why I am sharing a few family favorites with you: our Puppy Chow Recipe and Cracker Candy Recipe!

I made two different snacks yesterday, with Ms. Sarah’s help (of course!) By getting the kiddos involved, it does two things for you. 1) creates memories for them that will last a lifetime and 2) save you a few physical steps! You have lots of opportunities to make comments like yes this will be sweet – but not as sweet as YOU are! (And then steal a kiss!)
🙂

First, we made our “cracker candy recipe”. It’s her job to line the jellyroll pan with the club crackers (you can use saltines or even cheese-its). While she does this, I put a cup of sugar and 2 sticks of butter in the saucepan and stir until bubbly. My hot mixture gets poured over the crackers and then the pan is moved into a preheated, 400* oven for just five minutes.

Remove from the oven, sprinkle about a cup of chocolate chips over and let sit a minute. The heat of the toffee will melt the chocolate and you can spread (frost) it. Sprinkle a few chopped nuts or, in our case, about a fourth of a bag of toffee bits. It should look like the above picture. Pop it in the fridge for an hour or so to cool, then pop out of the pan and break it apart and dig in.

I warn you, my husband calls this “candy crack” as he eats it until I take it away and hide it, LOL!

Let’s break down cost:
Crackers – FREE
Butter – $.30 a stick
Sugar – bought on sale with double coupon, I roughly figure I used $.12 of it
Chocolate Chips – FREE
Toffee Chips – FREE

SOOOO, we made the whole pan for under $.50 and it should last at least a week. (As long as my hubby doesn’t find it, LOL)!

While the cracker candy was in the oven, we made “puppy chow”!

How to Make Puppy Chow

Get out that big Tupperware bowl, and dump in 9 cups of Chex cereal- we used Rice Chex!
In a microwave-safe dish add 1/2 a stick of butter, 1//2 a cup of peanut butter, 1 cup chocolate chips, and 1/2 tsp vanilla extract. Zap a minute and stir to combine all ingredients. (you might need to zap an additional 30 sec or so).

Pour the mixture over the cereal, cover the bowl and shake it all up! This will coat the cereal evenly with the chocolate mix. FYI -Ms. Sarah is an EXCELLENT shaker! Open it up and check, then add a cup of powdered sugar. Seal the bowl and shake again…then pour it onto something where you can spread it out for a bit – I spread the puppy chow out over two of my large pizza pans.

When it’s cool and looks like my picture, you can put it into the cookie jar or, in our case, smaller, portioned-sized Tupperware containers that I can tuck back into the cupboards and just drop in a lunch or picnic bag!

Let’s break down cost:
Chex cereal – FREE after sale price and double coupons
Peanut Butter – $.50 a jar after sale price, coupon, and Register Rewards – I used about 1/8 the jar for a cost of $.07
Butter – $.30 a stick and I used $.15
Powdered Sugar – a 2# bag for $1 (not fantastic) and I used about 1/6 of it – $.17

This snack costs under $.50 and made 10 cups worth! HOW it goes in as 9 cups of cereal and comes out 10 cups of treat always cracks me up.

Two yummy treats for just under $1 and in under 30 minutes. My assistant was SO PROUD to take a piece of the candy to her daddy because she helped make it!

What are YOUR favorite treats to make?

Here are some other recipes you might enjoy:

• Fall Fun M&M Monkey Bread
• Use Leftover Candy Canes to Make Valentine Suckers
• Breakfast Cookies – A Great Way To Start the Day!