How to Win the Holiday Cookie Contest Without Really Trying
Today, I will continue my quick, lighthearted holiday posts so that those who are already overtaxed by holiday responsibilities can relax and be entertained for a bit.
Last weekend, I attended a neighborhood holiday cookie and ornament party. As I was rushing about last-minute trying to figure out what to make, I remembered a silly recipe I first heard about in junior high.
I was on a committee with two other girls to plan a class potluck holiday party. We went around asking everyone in the class what they were going to bring. One girl (a sweet friend) indicated that she would bring a dessert consisting of cornflakes, marshmallows and red hot candies. As we raised our eyebrows at this interesting confection, she assured us, “It’s really good.” As we did the planning we snickered as we wrote down “cornflake thing” for one of the desserts. In the end, the girl brought something else so we never got to taste the cornflake dessert.
I was reminded of this interesting dessert when someone on Twitter (unfortunately, can’t remember who) recently posted a similar recipe. “I have to bring this.” I thought. If nothing else, it will be good for a laugh.
There are a ton of recipes out there for this luscious dessert. Here is one from Kellogg’s, the makers of Corn Flakes cereal. The basic ingredients are simple, butter, marshmallows, vanilla extract, green food coloring, Corn Flakes and red hot candies. You melt the butter, melt the marshmallows and add green food coloring and vanilla extract. You then add Corn Flakes to make a Rice Krispie treat like dessert.
The hard part is getting the hot, sticky mix out of the pan and forming it into circular wreaths before it hardens. If you are really good (or have an extra pair of hands to help you) you can manage to form the wreaths and stick the red hots on the molten mix so that they will stay put as the wreath cools. If you are more of a novice (like me) you will barely be able to get the wreaths formed before the mixture cools and you will need to stick on the red hots either by remelting the butter/marshmallow remnants in the pan, dipping the red hots in and sticking them to each wreath or you can also use vanilla icing (suggested in the Kellogg’s recipe).
They come together quickly and I let them harden up a bit in the fridge before putting them on a plate for the party. They were bright and cheery looking! The cornflake texture and shape made them look like holly wreaths.
At the party, all the neighbors brought wonderful, elegant, homemade cookies, mostly in chocolate. I set down my bright green and red cookies among the other dishes and thought they were already having the desired hilarity effect.
Later on in the party, the cookie judging commenced. There were several categories of judging for the cookies. To our amazement, we won in the “best decorated” category.
As we were leaving the party, we filled up a little treat box taking home one of each cookie. When it came time to take ours home, I discovered that these wreath cookies are a little heat sensitive. Sitting out for an hour or so, they had started to melt just a bit so that the stacked cookies were becoming one big sticky blob! I have no idea how everyone else managed to taste one (or if they even did!). If you are going to make these yourself, definitely don’t stack them or put them in individual plastic treat bags.
When we got home, we finally tasted one ourselves. It tastes an awful lot like a Rice Krispie treat. The red hots were a bit crunchy and would have been better if they were more like a jelly bean in texture.
But overall, it was cute and it was (literally) a winner!
