21 Days of Cookies: Day 12
There’s a time for intricate, complicated holiday cookies, and there’s a time for “throw a bunch of stuff in a pan and bake it”. This is a time when we throw it all in the pan and it’s over in 15 minutes. Time is generally at a premium around the holidays, so isn’t it nice to have some standby recipes that you can just toss in a pan, cut and serve, with no possible way to mess it up?
This recipe caught my eye for its simplicity. Also because it doesn’t have any chocolate, which many “layer” recipes do. It doesn’t need them. The combination of the buttery homemade caramel, cinnamon, vanilla, coconut, and almonds sitting on a nice toasty graham cracker – it’s devastatingly good.
First, put 12 graham crackers in a foil-lined 15x10x1 pan. Don’t have this size pan? Use a standard half sheet. It will just be a bigger pan than you technically need.
Next, sprinkle marshmallows over the graham crackers.
Then, cook butter, brown sugar, and cinnamon until it’s turning into caramel. Remove it from the heat and add your vanilla. Pour (or spoon, for more accuracy) it evenly over the graham crackers and marshmallows.
Sprinkle your coconut and almonds on top. That’s seriously it.
Then you just stick it in the oven long enough for it all to get bubbly and mush itself together. While the instructions say to bake this in the oven “until brown”, since I bake with a gas oven, this is near impossible for me. So after my baking time was over, with no visible browning, I ended up putting it under the broiler for 2-3 minutes to nicely toast those marshmallows. Mmmmm.
Then you just wait for it to cool completely, then cut it up into triangles. Each graham cracker (figure 1) gets cut into 4 pieces: first into 2 squares (figure 2), then cut each square into a triangle (figure 3). Since we started with 12, that gives us 48 servings.
If you can’t stop eating them, don’t say I didn’t warn you. I’m sorry.
They’re ready to be packaged up and given away! Or, hoarded as you binge watch Hallmark Christmas movies. I won’t tell.
Christmas Graham Cracker Crack
Ingredients
- 12 graham crackers
- 2 cups mini marshmallows
- ¾ cup butter lightly salted
- ¾ cup light brown sugar packed
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1 cup sliced almonds, toasted or use pecans or walnuts
- 1 cup flaked coconut
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350.
- Line a 15x10x1 pan with foil. Place graham crackers in a single layer in the pan. You can use a different size pan, but the 12 graham crackers fit just about perfectly in this one.
- Sprinkle marshmallows over graham crackers.
- In a saucepan, melt brown sugar, butter, and cinnamon together, and cook over medium heat until the butter is melted and the brown sugar is dissolved. You don't need to bring it to a boil; we're not making candy.
- Remove mixture from heat and stir in vanilla extract.
- Pour or spoon the brown sugar mixture evenly over the graham crackers.
- Sprinkle almonds and coconut over the top of the graham crackers.
- Bake for 14-16 minutes or until browned.
- Cool completely.
- Cut into squares, then triangles.
