Valentine’s Crunch Mix

January is over! I can’t believe that we made it through a whole month already! This year is flying by!

Since it is February I put out all of my Valentine’s Day decor and my girl’s have been excited to get some fun “Love Day” stuff happening. Cards, treats, parties, and even a Valentine’s Day dance this year. Oy!

Last week we made these Easy Valentine’s Day Cupcakes. This weekend we decided that we needed to make another delicious Valentine’s Day treat. So I went to Pinterest. After looking around for a while I remembered that one of my Facebook friends had posted her cereal mix recipe last week. I went and looked it up. We made a couple of changes to make it fit our needs and came up with this yummy treat was was made and eaten up in less than 2 hours. Fortunately I have enough supplies to make it again to take to a party next week.

• Servings: 24
• Time: 10mins
• Difficulty: Easy
• Print

This recipe is so easy to make – even the kids can help and it’s perfect for any Valentine’s Day party or just for a weeknight treat.

Ingredients

• 6 cups Chex cereal (I used half rice and half corn)
• 2 cups pretzels (I used the small square ones)
• .75 cups light Karo syrup
• .5 cup sugar
• .5 cup butter
• 1 cup plain Valentine’s Day M&M’s
• 1 cup mini marshmallows
• pink and red sprinkles

Directions

1. Mix the cereal and pretzels in a large mixing bowl.
2. Melt the butter in a medium saucepan.
3. Add the Karo syrup and sugar to the melted butter.
4. Heat together over medium heat until boiling.
5. Boil for two minutes.
6. Pour evenly over the cereal/pretzel mix and mix well.
7. Add marshmallows and M&M’s and mix well.
8. Spread mixture onto a greased cookie sheet and have the kids sprinkle the sprinkles over the top of the crunch.
9. Allow to cool completely.
10. If they don’t eat it all in one sitting (yeah, right) place the leftovers in an air tight container for tomorrow.

You can buy Valentine’s Day treat bags and use them to hand out your treat to friends and neighbors! My girls are making a double batch to take to their friend’s Valentine’s Day party before the school dance.

Can You Make That Poke Cake?

My daughter asked me the other day if I can make the “poke cake thing”. I had zero idea what in the heck she was talking about until she mentioned Jell-o. Now, I do not like Jell-o in general but when used to make a delicious cake? I am all in!

Jell-o Poke Cake

This cake might be the easiest cake to make. The best thing about it – no frosting!

For this cake you need to make a plain old vanilla cake. I used a basic vanilla cake recipe that I use for cupcakes, but I just poured all of the batter into a 9 x 13 cake pan.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup white sugar (or sugar substitute; we use a substitute and it works great)
• 1 egg
• 1 tea pure vanilla
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 cup milk
• ½ cup butter, soft
• ½ tea salt
• 1 ½ cups flour (we use wheat flour)
• 1/2 cup frozen strawberries; thawed and blended

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• Cream together shortening and sugar. Add in the egg and vanilla, beating until light and fluffy. Combine the flour, baking powder, and salt in a separate bowl. Take turns adding the dry mixture and milk into the creamy mixture. Stir in the thawed frozen blended strawberries.
• Bake for 30 to 40 minutes in preheated oven or until a toothpick comes out clean. You need to watch your cake. Every oven is different and will cook at various speeds. This particular cake came out a little darker than I would have liked but I think the strawberries that I added might have something to do with that.
• Cool completely.

Once the cake is cooled completely I put it into a container that was lined in aluminium foil. The next step is to take a dowel or skewer and poke holes all over your cake – this is where you can get the little kids involved.

Next, mix a packet of strawberry (or whatever flavor you like) Jello with 1 cup boiling water until dissolved. Once dissolved add 1/2 cup cold water and mix. Pour mixture slowly and evenly over the cake. It might not look like it is getting in the holes, but it is. Next place the cake into the refrigerator for an hour or longer. I leave mine for at least about 2 hours.

Now frost the cake. Oh wait! Don’t use frosting. Whip up a little whipping cream and frost it with that! It is light and airy and delicious. I think that this cake would be strange with regular frosting as frosting is too thick. Remember to refrigerate leftovers. This one was gone in less than 2 days so I really don’t know how long it should last. As a rule at my house everything is thrown out in 2-3 days if not consumed.