No-bake s’mores cookies

Our Independence Day ritual usually features a trudge to the beach, a flag football game, and too many cheese curls. We grill hot dogs, light a fire if we’ve been lucky enough to score a fire pit, and have some s’mores. Of course the day starts with packing the cooler, prepping the meat and veg for the grill, and lugging it all out to the car… then lugging it all across the sand … and of course lugging it back to the car and back into the house at the end of the night.

This year, I wanted no lugging. I wanted no grill cleaning. I wanted no sand in my shoes.

But you know, I still wanted me some s’mores. So I pulled out a trusty recipe from middle school Home Economics – no-bake oatmeal cookies – switched out the oatmeal for graham crackers and marshmallows, reduced the sugar to bearable, and voila! The perfect end to our non-BBQ July 4 feeding extravaganza.

No-bake s’mores cookiesYield: About 24 cookies

Ingredients
½ cup butter or margarine
1 cup sugar
½ cup lowfat milk (soymilk works too!)
4 Tbsp. cocoa powder (unsweetened)
½ cup peanut butter (I like natural crunchy)
2 tsp. best quality vanilla extract
4 cups graham cracker pieces
1 cup mini marshmallows

Put graham cracker pieces and marshmallows into a large mixing bowl. Set aside. Lay out a long piece of waxed or parchment paper on your counter.

In a 2-quart saucepan, melt butter or margarine over medium-low. Add sugar, milk, and cocoa, stirring gently; bring to a boil. Remove from heat.

Add peanut butter and vanilla to saucepan; stir gently until mixture is smooth. Allow to cool, stirring frequently, for five minutes.

Using a wooden spoon, gently fold chocolately deliciousness into crackers and mallows until well covered. (CAUTION: Allow saucepan to cool some more before licking clean.)

Drop cookies by heaping tablespoon (I used the tableware kind of tablespoon, rather than the measuring kind) onto wax paper. Allow to cool completely until fully set, 20 minutes to an hour.

Store in airtight container, separating layers of cookies with wax paper, in a cool place (fridge or freezer work great) for up to a week. Good luck not eating all of them immediately!