The Painted Apron

Gifts from the Kitchen, Harvest Snack Attack

Posted by the Painted Apron on October 1, 2012 · 1 Comment 

Recently my son-in-law NG, [the Nicest Guy] was looking a little pathetic, feeling used and abused during our recent “Big Garage Sale”…he did work really hard, was the Main Muscle and had to move, haul, and carry a LOT of stuff.  To cheer him up I promised him a sweet treat and he smiled and pointed to his mouth, saying “Yes, my poor sweet tooth has been neglected lately.”  Well, no problem there, I knew I could fix that! When browsing recipes for my bucket list this month, I decided I wanted to make some form of snack mix with a fall theme.  I looked through chex mix recipes on allrecipes.com.  I love this website because you can learn so much from the comment section.  Fueled with some ideas, I headed to the store to get the ingredients.

NG loves caramel, so that’s what I was going to emphasize in this Fall snack mix.  The Cinnamon Chex will add another layer of seasonal flavor.
He also loves cashews so I got some honey roasted cashews and peanut mix, caramel bugles, Snaps pretzels, white chocolate & butterscotch chips, and Vanilla Cupcake Goldfish Grahams. This ought to make a big batch of sweet & salty glop! Perfect!

I used a baking pan with about 1″ sides to hold this concoction, and tossed together the Cinnamon Chex, pretzels, bugles, grahams and nuts. I stirred the brown sugar and vanilla into the melted butter and poured over all.  Then the mix was stirred thoroughly with a large spoon to coat all the ingredients with the butter sugar mixture.

Bake the mix for about 30 minutes at 250 degrees, stirring after 15 minutes.

Hot out of the oven toss the chocolate and butterscotch chips into the mix and let them sit for a minute to start melting.

Gently stir the mix to distribute the melting chips

Refrigerate until cooled and hard

Sweet and Salty Chocolate Yum…ready for packaging!

I include a little bag of Magic Cracker Candy too…

I put the snack mix  in a large clear bag, tied it with a pumpkin print ribbon and attached a computer generated tag.  A little time with the presentation makes a huge impact.  I could have handed him a brown bag of this stuff and he would have loved it, but a special touch with the wrapping elevates a simple gift to the extraordinary!

Give someone special a surprise Gift from YOUR Kitchen soon!

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This recipe is on the Paint Bucket October as HARVEST CHEX MIX

Here’s my recipe

HARVEST SNACK ATTACK

makes a great gift!

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Course Appetizer, Dessert, Gift, Snack

Cuisine American

Ingredients

  

• 3 cups Cinnamon Chex
• 2 cups Synder’s Snaps pretzels
• 1 cup goldfish grahams vanilla cupcake
• 1 cup caramel bugles
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 6 oz can of Planter’s honey roasted peanuts & cashews
• 1/4 c butter
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 cup white chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup butterscotch chips

Instructions

 

• Combine chex, pretzels, grahams, bugles and nuts in a large baking pan with sides.
• Melt butter and stir in vanilla and brown sugar.
• Pour butter mixture over dry ingredients and stir to coat.
• Bake 250 1 hr, stirring every after 15 minutes.
• Toss the chips onto the hot mix and let sit for 1 minute to begin melting.
• Gently toss and stir mix to distribute the melting chips. Cool and refrigerate to harden.
• Break into hunks and store in a canister or package for giving. This makes a big ole bag full, enough to keep a little, and a lot to share!

Keyword chex mix, harvest snack mix, hostess gift, snack, snack mix, sweet and salty