Rice Krispie Cake...

To lighten the mood and throw a little whimsy into this week's Wednesday Treat Day, we thought we would open a line to the kid in everyone's heart with this Rice Krispie Cake!

Who says you have to serve those beloved treats in bar form anyway? This is your basic Krispie treat recipe, though we fiddled with the amounts to get nice texture, along with adding some salt to cut the sweetness. Because we are sneaking a hidden surprise in the middle, we divided and pressed the cereal mixture between two cake pans, rather than into one pan and having to try and slice it in half.

While the cereal layers were resting, we quickly made a chocolate-y filling by melting together a couple pats of butter with a few scoops of marshmallows - when almost melted and combined, we threw in a scant cup of chopped bittersweet chocolate. I used bittersweet because that is what I keep on hand in the pantry, but semisweet would be acceptable. When it was still warm, but not right-off-the-stove warm, I topped one cereal layer with it and let it stand, uncovered, for a few minutes to start setting up. As the dark, sticky filling sits, it starts to set and the stickiness goes away, but it still stays pretty soft - it reminded me of a warm tootsie roll in fact! The other layer went on top and was pressed down into the filling to secure the two layers together. You may now have some filling exposed, but in the directions you'll notice we have you set aside some of the cereal mixture before pressing it into the cake pans. This mixture is used now to patch and hide any of that filling!

You could serve this as is, but it may look a little pale... so to brighten it up, we cracked open some of Jeff's favorite cereals and decorated away! We used chocolate and vanilla cereal balls around the bottom and top edge, then used brightly colored, fruity rounds everywhere else! Since we didn't wait too long to do this, the "cake" was still a little tacky and the cereal stuck right on without needing any additional help. Be sure to give the assembled piece at least 30 minutes to an hour or so before cutting into it... this gives it a chance to become stable and make slicing easier. If keeping it longer, like we needed to, just cover it well in plastic wrap so the cereals don't dry out. Yes, it may be a little silly and it is still pretty sweet, but I think we all need that rush from time to time, don't we?

We didn't prepare anything new or exceptionally exciting as sides for tonight's dinner, but we still have a pleasing protein dish to share!

The great thing about these Hoisin-Marinated Pork Chops is the fact that they need to chill out in the refrigerator for at least 8 hours, giving them time to absorb the marinate - you could certainly do them the night before as well, which is what we did. Perfect deal for when you know you'll be busy the next day and can't fuss with a messy dinner preparation!

Besides having just a few, but potent, ingredients in the marinade, it also got bonus points for not having to dirty up a bowl and whisk to prepare it! Just throw the soy sauce, hoisin, honey, crushed red pepper and a couple cloves of minced garlic into a zip-loc bag, squish it around and toss the chops right in.

If you have a grill, by all means fire it up if you like, but we just plugged in our ever-handy Griddler as we just had four chops to cook... besides, it is still quite chilly outside! We like to take our pork off around 140 to 145 degrees and let them rest - this provides pork that is still plenty moist and tender... however, I won't be in your kitchen watching you, so take them as far as you need to feel comfortable.

The potent marinade hit lots of points - salty, sweet, tangy and spicy with a touch of savory from those minced garlic cloves. Serve whole as we did, or how about slicing it up to toss in a fried rice dish or rice noodle salad?

Recipes
Rice Krispie Cake
Hoisin-Marinated Pork Chops