Rice Krispies Challenge & $100 Visa Gift Card Giveaway!

This past August I was asked to participate in a Rice Krispies Challenge along with 10 other amazing bloggers thanks to TheMotherhood.com and RiceKrispies.com. I wouldn't consider myself to be the most creative person, especially when it comes to cooking and baking...so this definitely was something that I had to put some time and thought into. I ended up coming up with the 'Chocolate Covered Bananas Recipe' (which you may remember me posting about) and had a lot of fun. That's why I was excited when asked if I'd like to take part in an end of the year Rice Krispies Challenge.

To get started, we were sent a few holiday items to inspire our holiday creativity, as well as several boxes of Rice Krispies and a $100 GC to purchase the ingredients and items we would need for the recipe and to use at a Rice Krispies Holiday Exchange Party if we wanted.

This time around our challenge was to create a 'Stunning holiday Show Stopper' - the kind of dessert display that stops guests in their tracks to admire when they walk through the door. I have to admit that at first my mind was going in all different directions. Since the holidays bring many get-togethers and parties, I wanted to make sure that I created something that would be large enough to feed a crowd, while still being a show stopping display that would would catch people's attention.

I knew I wanted it to be Christmasy...so I went with one of my first ideas of doing a Christmas Tree, but also wanted to include something yummy in the actual Rice Krispies Treats recipe that would make it unique from regular Rice Krispies Treats. Last time I used dried bananas and it really gave it a nice flavor. This time I wanted to use something that would remind people of the holidays, and decided to go with Peppermint and Spearmint Candies (chopped up). YUM!


Recipe:

I used 4 circular cake pans (3 different sizes) to pour the following ingredients into. I filled each pan.

Ingredients -

• 6 Boxes of Rice Krispies
• 8 1/2 Bags of Marshmallows
• 3 1/2 Sticks of Butter
• Green Food Coloring
• Red Food Coloring
• Yellow Food Coloring
  
• Tube of white frosting
• Tube of green frosting
• Tube of red frosting
• 3 3/4 C of Spearmint (green) candies (chopped up)
  
• 1/2 C of Peppermint (red) candies (chopped up)

Directions:
Christmas Tree/Gifts-
1. Melt 3 T Butter
2. Add 1 bag of Marshmallows and melt.
3. Add 1/2 Cup Chopped Up Spearmint Candies
4. Add 6 Cups Rice Krispies
5. Add 20 drops of green food coloring
6. Pour into pan (I used 4 circular cake pans)

Repeat Steps 1-6, eight times (I had two pans out and was making two batches at a time), filling the circular cake pans (or whatever pan you're using) as you go. My cake pans were different sizes, so the bottom took 3.5 batches (1 batch = Steps 1-6), the middle two took 1.5 batches each and the top took 1 batch.

7. Once set up, remove Rice Krispies Treats from pan and cut into the shape of a star (four different sizes) using a large knife.

8. Stack stars going from largest on the bottom to smallest on top, staggering points to look like a Christmas tree.

Having a star cake pan would have been helpful, but I decided to freehand cut it (you could also leave them as circles for the tree instead of cutting them into stars if you wish). Since I was cutting the stars from each circle, I ended up with a lot of extra pieces. Instead of just throwing it away, I wanted to use it and formed the extra pieces into the shape of gifts of all sizes. I initially wanted to have them a different color than the tree, but thought this was a great way to use the left over Rice Krispies Treats.

9. Use tube of Red frosting to decorate the gifts as you wish.

*Please note that you can adjust the recipe to your needs, using different sized pans/stars.

Ornaments/Christmas Tree Star-
1. Melt 3 T Butter
2. Add 1 bag of Marshmallows and melt
3. Add 1/2 Cup Chopped Up Peppermint Candies

*Take 1/4 of the mixture and separate to use with Christmas Tree Star
4. Add 20 drops of red food coloring
4. Add 5 Cups Rice Krispies
6. Pour into muffin pan (will need two muffin pans) - each cup 1/2 full

7. Once cool, take out of pan and decorate with white and green frosting as you wish and set on tree.
8. *Take the 1/4 mixture you set aside and add 10 drops of yellow food coloring and 1 C of Rice Krispies.

9. Once cooled off enough to touch, form together and let sit until cool enough to cut with a star cookie cutter.
10. Use a sucker stick or toothpick to stick to top of tree.

The finished product - a show-stopping dessert display:

You can click to enlarge

Although this recipe is more involved and takes a bit more time (approx. 1 1/2 hours from start to finish), it was quite simple and a lot of fun. Many times I will spend the same amount of time on making a couple batches of Christmas cookies and frosting them...so I thought it was well worth it to get the outcome that I did. I think it would make a great 'show stopping display' at any get-together over the holidays and would be easy for people to grab from and eat.

We didn't have a chance to have a holiday party or goodie exchange, but we did have several family members over after making it. We received a lot of positive feedback about the way it looked, as well as the way it tasted. Everyone, including myself, was especially delighted with the peppermint and spearmint in the recipe. It added such great flavor, perfect for this time of year!

GIVEAWAY: One VERY lucky winner is going to win a $100 Visa Gift Card (Ends December 21, 2010 11:59 PM (ET)

Mandatory Entry - Leave a comment below letting me know how you like your Rice Krispies Treats. (Do you like to eat something special with them, put something special in them when making, etc?).

The Sponsor's rules state that there be only one enter per person for this giveaway. By leaving your answer to the question above in a comment on this post, you'll be entered to win a $100 Visa Gift Card. For official rules, please read below:

Abbreviated Rules. No Purchase Necessary. Begins no earlier than 12:00:00 AM (ET) on 11/29/10 and ends no later than 11:59:59 PM (ET) on 12/21/10. For complete Official Rules, go to http://web.mediacdt.com/docs/motherhoodholiday. Open to legal residents of the fifty (50) United States and District of Columbia who are 18 years of age or older at time of entry. Subject to complete Official Rules. Void where prohibited. Sponsor: TheMotherhood; www.TheMotherhood.com

**I am participating in a paid campaign sponsored by the makers of Kellogg's Rice Krsipies cereal. A GC for me to use to purchase necessary ingredients, as well as boxes of Rice Krispies Cereal was provided for free. A $100 GC was also provided to one lucky reader.**