NPR News

Christmas Rocky Road

NPR | By Nigella Lawson

Published November 30, 2009 at 12:41 AM EST

It's not that I felt my usual Rocky Road Crunch Bars needed any improvement (though fiddling with recipes is one of life's pleasures) but I thought they would benefit from seasonal adjustment. So, out go the plain cookies and in come amaretti cookies and — in the seasonal spirit –- I've crammed in some Brazil nuts and candied cherries (as red as Rudolph's nose), along with snowy mini marshmallows. The fresh snowfall of confectioner's sugar on top might seem seasonal enough, but not for me. So I add some edible glitter in Disco Hologram White.

Ingredients:

1 1/4 cups (8 oz) bittersweet chocolate, chopped or chips
3/4 cups (6 oz) milk chocolate, chopped or chips
1 1/2 sticks (12 tablespoons) soft butter
1/4 cup golden syrup, such as Lyle's, or light corn syrup
Approx. 4 cups (7 oz) amaretti cookies (not the soft ones)
1 cup shelled Brazil nuts
2/3 cup candied or glazed cherries
2 1/2 cups mini marshmallows
1 tablespoon confectioner's sugar
Edible glitter (optional)

Instructions:

Put both chocolates into a heavy-based pan to melt with the butter and syrup over a gentle heat.

Put the cookies into a freezer bag and bash them with a rolling pin to get big- and little-sized crumbs; you want some pieces to crunch and some sandy rubble.

Put the Brazil nuts into another freezer bag and also bash them so you get different-sized nut rubble.

Take the pan off the heat, and add the crushed cookies and nuts, whole candied cherries and mini marshmallows. Turn carefully to coat everything with syrupy chocolate.

Tip into an aluminum foil pan (I use one 9 1/4 x 12 inches), smoothing the top as best you can, although it will look bumpy.

Refrigerate until firm enough to cut, which will take about 1 1/2-2 hours. Then take the set block of Rocky Road out of the pan ready to cut.

Push the confectioners' sugar through a small strainer to dust the top of the Rocky Road. Then, if you like, add sprinkling of edible glitter for some festive sparkle.

With the long side in front of you, cut it into 6 slices down and 4 across, so that you have 24 almost-squares.

Makes 24 big-bite-sized bars