Christmas Puppy Chow (Reindeer Munch) With Pretzels and Popcorn
Snowy powdered sugar over chocolate and peanut butter coated cereal, with red and green candy tumbled through popcorn and pretzels. That’s Christmas puppy chow (or reindeer chow, or reindeer munch – depending on whose kitchen you grew up in).
Eight ingredients, half an hour start to finish and no baking – which matters in a month when the oven is already booked. Grab your biggest bowl and let’s make it.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- The oven stays off, which means this can happen while something else is already baking.
- Eight ingredients, and you can pick up all of them in one trip.
- Four different things get folded in, so no two handfuls come out quite the same.
- It makes about ten cups, enough for a party bowl with plenty left over to fill jars.
- The powdered sugar step is the fun part, and it is exactly the job to hand to a kid who wants to help.
When and Who This Is For
This is the December snack that sits out while everything else is happening. A bowl on the counter during tree decorating, something to put in front of people who turned up before you were ready, a handful grabbed on the way past that carries you to dinner.
It works for a crowd with kids in it. The mix is vegetarian, and it has peanuts and dairy in it.
The pretzels are the only wheat here, but the candy coated chocolates are not labeled gluten free and are made on lines shared with wheat, so this is not a bowl for a celiac guest.
If peanut butter is the issue, the holiday popcorn with M&Ms and pretzels covers similar ground without any.
Ingredients
Makes about 10 cups.
- 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips (170 g)
- ½ cup creamy peanut butter (130 g)
- 6 cups Rice Chex cereal (170 g)
- 2 cups powdered sugar (240 g)
- 2 cups popped kettle corn popcorn (15 g)
- 1 cup square lattice pretzels (45 g)
- ½ cup red and green M&Ms (100 g)
- ½ cup red and green holiday gumdrops (100 g), such as DOTS
A note on the cereal, because the name trips people up. This is plain Chex cereal, the boxed breakfast kind, not the bagged Chex Mix party snack with the rye chips and the seasoning on it. Rice Chex is the usual choice here but Corn Chex behaves exactly the same way.
Semisweet chocolate is doing real work against two full cups of powdered sugar. Milk chocolate melts just as happily, though the finished mix leans a good deal sweeter.
The peanut butter I used is the standard creamy kind rather than a natural style that separates in the jar, since the loose oil in natural peanut butter can stop the coating from setting firmly.
Square lattice pretzels hold their shape in a mix better than thin twists, which tend to snap into shards once things start getting tossed around.
How to Make Christmas Puppy Chow
- Melt the chocolate. Put the chocolate chips in a large microwave safe bowl and heat in 30 second bursts, stirring between each one, until almost all of them have gone. Stir the last few smooth off the heat rather than microwaving them into submission, because chocolate scorches fast once it has nothing left to melt.
- Stir in the peanut butter. Add the peanut butter to the warm chocolate and stir until the two come together completely, glossy and even with no streaks left running through it.
- Coat the cereal. Give the chocolate a minute or two to lose its worst heat, then pour it over the cereal in a large bowl and fold gently until every piece is covered. Pouring it on straight from the microwave is what makes cereal go soft, so that short pause is doing more than it looks like.
4. Add the powdered sugar. Tip the powdered sugar over the coated cereal and toss until everything is covered and the pieces have gone pale.
5. Spread and cool. Spread the cereal out on a parchment lined baking sheet and leave it until the chocolate has set and the pieces feel cool, about 15 minutes. Spreading it thin matters here, since a mound sitting in a bowl holds its heat far longer than a single layer does.
6. Add everything else. Tip the popcorn, pretzels, M&Ms, and gumdrops into your largest bowl, add the cooled cereal on top, and toss gently to combine. The candies go in last for a reason: put them on anything still warm and the color runs straight out of the shells and into the powdered sugar.
7. Serve or store. Pile it into a serving bowl, or go straight into jars and bags while it is fresh.
Tips and Variations
- Shake instead of stirring for the sugar. A large zip top bag or a lidded container gets the powdered sugar into every crease with far less breakage than a spoon manages, and it saves you a dusted countertop.
- Work in two batches if the bowl is crowded. Half the cereal with half the sugar, then the rest. All two cups going in at once tends to land in patches and leave bare spots behind.
- Leave the clumps alone. The pieces that stick together in twos and threes hold the most sugar, and breaking them up is the one bit of tidying that makes the mix worse.
- Everything needs to be dry. A few drops of water in the bowl or on the spatula will seize melted chocolate into a grainy paste that refuses to pour.
- Sunflower seed butter stands in for the peanut butter if nuts are off the table, and it sets the same way.
- Gluten free pretzels take care of the wheat, though the candies still are not certified.
- Crushed candy canes stirred in at the end bring peppermint into it.
- Corn Chex swaps in one for one. Crispix works too, though it does contain wheat.
Ways to Use It
This lands somewhere between a dessert and a sweet and salty snack mix, which makes it useful in more places than a tray of cookies.
- Fill small mason jars, tie a ribbon around the lid, and send them out as neighbor and teacher gifts.
- Scoop it into cellophane bags for a cookie exchange table, where it stands out for being the one thing nobody had to bake.
- Set a bowl out on a snack board next to the cheese, the chocolate, and the clementines.
- Portion it into paper cups for a class party or a kids’ table.
- Bag some up for the car on the way to see family.
- Keep a bowl within reach of the couch on a Christmas movie night.
Questions You May Have About This Snack Mix
How long does puppy chow last?
Honestly, in a room with people in it? About twenty minutes. But if you want to make it ahead, just put a lid on it once it’s done and it keeps for around five days at room temperature. The popcorn is what tells you the clock has run out, since it goes soft well before the cereal does. Somewhere cool and dry matters more than you would think, because humidity is what turns the sugar coating tacky.
Can you freeze puppy chow?
You can, and it holds up better than you might expect. Seal it into a freezer bag with as much air pressed out as you can manage and it keeps for a couple of months. Let it come back to room temperature still sealed rather than opening it cold, since condensation landing on powdered sugar is what makes it go sticky. One thing specific to this version: the popcorn is the part that suffers, so if you are working well ahead, freeze the coated cereal on its own and add the rest on the day.
Is puppy chow safe for dogs?
No, and the name really does not help here. Chocolate is toxic to dogs, and the quantity in a batch this size is not small. If you have a dog who counter surfs, a bowl sitting out at nose height over the holidays is worth a second thought, particularly with visitors coming and going and doors being left open behind them.
Why did mine turn out soggy instead of crisp?
Almost always heat. Chocolate poured on straight from the microwave soaks into the cereal rather than sitting on the outside of it, and powdered sugar added to a warm coating dissolves into a paste instead of staying powdery. Giving the chocolate a minute before it meets the cereal, then letting the coated cereal cool properly before the sugar goes on, takes care of both.
Is this the same thing as muddy buddies?
Same snack, different name. Muddy Buddies is General Mills’ branded version, the one sold in bags and printed on the side of the Chex box, and puppy chow is what most people call the homemade one. Christmas muddy buddies, reindeer chow, monkey munch, and reindeer munch all point at the same bowl. Which one comes out of your mouth mostly comes down to where you grew up.
Related Recipes
- Holiday popcorn with M&Ms and pretzels for the same red and green look without any peanut butter in it.
- Reindeer chocolate with pretzels and M&Ms if you want something from the same ingredient shelf that breaks into pieces instead.
- Valentine’s Day puppy chow for when the red and green need to become pink.
Before the Bowl Is Empty
There is something about a snack that everyone can reach into without asking first. No plates, no slicing, no standing around waiting on the oven. Make a batch on a quiet afternoon and it will carry you through the loud ones, some of it in a bowl on the counter and some of it in jars going out the door. Save it to your Christmas board so it’s there when December picks up speed. 🎄
Christmas Puppy Chow (Reindeer Munch) With Pretzels and Popcorn
Ingredients
- 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips 170 g
- ½ cup creamy peanut butter 130 g
- 6 cups Rice Chex cereal 170 g
- 2 cups powdered sugar 240 g
- 2 cups popped kettle corn popcorn 15 g
- 1 cup square lattice pretzels 45 g
- ½ cup red and green M&Ms 100 g
- ½ cup red and green holiday gumdrops 100 g, such as DOTS
Instructions
- Melt the chocolate chips in a large microwave safe bowl in 30 second bursts, stirring between each one, until almost melted. Stir the last few smooth off the heat.
- Add the peanut butter and stir until glossy and completely combined.
- Let the mixture sit for a minute or two, then pour it over the cereal in a large bowl and fold gently until every piece is coated.
- Add the powdered sugar and toss until the pieces are evenly covered.
- Spread on a parchment lined baking sheet and leave until set and cool to the touch, about 15 minutes.
- Put the popcorn, pretzels, M&Ms, and gumdrops in a large bowl, add the cooled cereal on top, and toss gently to combine.
- Serve, or portion into jars and bags.
Notes
- Keeps for about 5 days in an airtight container at room temperature, somewhere cool and dry. The popcorn softens before the cereal does, so that’s the part that sets the limit.
- Sunflower seed butter substitutes one for one for the peanut butter. Corn Chex substitutes for Rice Chex.
- Wait until the coated cereal is fully cool before the candies go in. Added to
anything still warm, the color bleeds out of the shells into the sugar.
