For my son’s baseball-themed birthday party this weekend, I wanted to serve peanuts and cracker jack. I just thought it wouldn’t be much of a baseball party without them. We found the peanuts without a problem, but the cracker jack was another story. Have they stopped making Cracker Jack? We looked everywhere and couldn’t find any, not even the individual snack boxes.
Just as I was about to give up on the whole cracker jack notion, I remembered who I was dealing with. I get a kick out of making homemade versions of random things, right? So how hard could it be to whip up some homemade cracker jack?
Actually, it’s not hard at all. And it was really quite good, considering it was prize-less. Plus the best part is that there are actually peanuts in the homemade version – like at least a few for every handful.
Homemade Cracker Jack
Ingredients
- 10 cup popped popcorn (air-popped or stove-popped, not microwave)
- 1 – 2 cup cocktail peanuts
- 1 cup butter
- 1 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 2 tsp vanilla
Instructions
- Combine popcorn and peanuts in a large bowl.
- In a small sauce pan, melt butter and brown sugar together. Bring to a slow boil and boil for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.
- Pour caramel sauce over popcorn and peanuts and toss to coat. Pour onto a cookie sheet or two and bake at 250 for 15-20 minutes, until dry.
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