These perfectly chewy Christmas rice krispie treats couldn't be easier to make festive thanks to a classic holiday baking ingredient and holiday sprinkles! You'll love the extra fun flavor these easy, no-bake holiday treats have, as well as their crisp and soft-but-not-too-sticky texture.
If I had to pick I'd choose chocolate rice krispie treats as my #1 favorite marshmallow cereal treat, but as a holiday theme super fan, I make exceptions this time of year!
These Christmas rice krispie treats incorporate red and green candied cherries for festive flair and are topped with Christmas nonpareils, white sparkling sugar, or whichever type of holiday sprinkle you have. And while using vanilla extract is just fine, I like to switch things up here and go with something else that provides an extra complementary flavor to the cherries.
All in, this is a no-bake, easy Christmas dessert the whole family can get in on. My usual rice krispie treat mission applies: to ensure there's an optimal cereal-to-marshmallow-to-butter ratio so these bars don't get too soft and sticky or too hard and scratchy, either. I had to adjust my chocolate version to account for the lost cocoa powder, but think this recipe hits the spot.
P.S. Do you ever have candied/glazed cherries leftover after making holiday treats like spritz cookies or fruitcake (or fruitcake cookies)? This is a great way to use them up.
Recipe Ingredients
- Crisped Rice Cereal: Name brand or store brand is fine! Just make sure they have a crispness to them and are not stale.
- Marshmallows: Mini marshmallows are recommended as they melt more quickly, and make sure they're fresh, or at least recently opened. Open/older packages harden as time goes by and won't provide those nice and squishy sections.
- Butter: This recipe calls for unsalted butter with separately added salt, but salted butter can be used in its place (omitting the extra salt).
- Extracts: I've made these Christmas-themed rice krispie treats with all vanilla extract, all almond extract, and a blend. All three ways are good, go with your preference!
- Candied Cherries: You'll often find these packaged in tubs in the baking aisle around the holidays, or online year-round. Either whole or halved is fine as they'll be chopped finer.
Step-by-Step Instructions
- Step 1: Melt together the butter and all but 1 cup of the marshmallows in a large pot.
- Step 2: Remove the pot from the heat and stir in the extract(s) and salt, then the cereal, cherries, and remaining marshmallows.
- Step 3: Press the mixture into an even layer in a parchment-lined 8- or 9-inch square pan.
- Step 4: Top with festive sprinkles (optional) and let cool fully before slicing into bars.
Can you stir the sprinkles in?
My worry with stirring sprinkles into something wet or hot is that their colors can bleed, which is especially true with nonpareils. They certainly can bleed as days go by even at room temperature on hardened anise cookie glaze.
I recommended gently pressing sprinkles into the top surface of these treats after a little time goes by and they've started to cool off (but aren't fully cooled). I haven't noticed any color bleeding after several days.
Recipe Tips and Tricks
- Pan Size - For extra-tall holiday rice krispie treats (seen in the first picture), use an 8-inch square pan. A 9-inch pan is just fine but the bars will be thinner (seen in the last picture, below).
- Spreading in Pan - Rice krispie treats are very sticky when warm! Use a greased spatula or piece of parchment paper to press it into the pan, or save the butter wrapper for this purpose.
- Decorations - Seen here are a red/green/white blend of nonpareils and white sparkle sugar, also called shimmer sugar. Christmas-themed jimmies or a shaped sprinkle (snowflakes, holly leaves and berries, green trees) are fun, too.
- Storage - Once cool, store these treats in an air-tight container at room temperature for up to several days. I have wrapped them in plastic wrap and frozen them in a freezer bag for several months. Nothing will beat freshly-made marshmallow cereal treats, but I thought this worked well.
More Festive Recipes
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Christmas Rice Krispie Treats
Ingredients
- 6 Tablespoons unsalted butter cut into large cubes
- 1 10 to 10.5 ounce (297g) bag mini marshmallows divided (roughly 5 ½ cups)
- ½ teaspoon almond extract (or vanilla extract, or a blend)
- ⅛ teaspoon salt
- 6 cups (6 ounces, 171g) crispy rice cereal
- ⅔ cup red and green candied cherries chopped small
- Festive Christmas sprinkles, sanding sugar, nonpareils, etc.
Instructions
- Line an 8- or 9-inch square pan with parchment paper so that it covers the bottom and all sides with a bit of overhang. Set aside.
- Add cubed butter and all but one cup of the marshmallows to a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan set on the stovetop over low-medium heat. Stir as the butter begins to melt and the marshmallows start expanding and losing their shape. Remove the pot from the heat as soon as the marshmallows have melted and the mixture is smooth.
- Now off the heat, stir the almond extract (and/or vanilla extract) and salt into the marshmallow mixture. In several alternating turns, stir in the crispy rice cereal, reserved cup of marshmallows, and chopped up candied cherries until evenly mixed.
- Turn out the cereal mixture into the parchment-lined pan and press it into an even layer firmly, but not too firmly as to make it very dense. This mixture will be sticky, so consider using the greased side of a butter wrapper, a cooking spray-coated spatula, or lightly moistened hands to help this process along.
- Once in the pan, wait 5-10 minutes for the mixture to start cooling down and scatter Christmas-themed sprinkles over top and lightly press in.
- Let the slab sit at room temperature for about one hour, or until cooled and solidified completely, before slicing into squares and serving.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional information is provided as an estimate. As it can vary due to many factors (brands used, quantities, etc.), we cannot guarantee its accuracy.
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