Today we ask How a Rice Krispie Treat is like a glue gun? and What does LCM stand for? as we taste chewy, crispy congealed goop. We avoid kissing our moms as we learn about cereal sculpting and what the ancients ate before we taste a divisive potato chip. Feel the Fizz of this Snapple Crack!
Rice Krispie Treats official recipe
Smitten Kitchen Salted Brown Butter Crispy Treats.
Molly's Now but Wow - If This Ever Gets Weird doc
Matthew Amster-Burton 0:00
Hi, I'm Matthew, and I'm Molly, and this is spilled milk, the show where we cook something delicious, eat it all, and you can't have any
Molly 0:10
today, we are talking about Rice Krispies Treats, which are also called Rice Krispie treats. Uh huh. Marshmallow treats. Marshmallow squares. Rice Krispies squares, and in Australia, LCM bars.
Matthew Amster-Burton 0:26
LCM bars. Yeah,
Molly 0:28
so I spent some time looking this up, so LCM, apparently does not stand for anything, but Kellogg's chose the name because they liked how the letters sounded together, and they wanted, like a different name for the Australian market, like, what? But it
Matthew Amster-Burton 0:45
probably lovely, lovely, crusty morsel.
Molly 0:48
Okay, some people have speculated that it stands for little crunchy munchies, okay, or light, crispy morsels, okay, I was really close. Kellogg says, Nope, okay.
Matthew Amster-Burton 0:57
I mean, I was really close to the thing that that Kellogg's denies.
Molly 1:01
So, yeah, these, I think that I might have suggested this episode sometime.
Matthew Amster-Burton 1:06
I think it says, it said that you suggested on the powdered sugar episode. I don't know why. Maybe they're not made.
Molly 1:12
They have no powdered sugar. Yeah, no, not at all. Matthew, what's on your memory lane for these bad boys?
Matthew Amster-Burton 1:21
Obviously, these were, these are a big treat when I was a kid. Did your did your parents make them? Yeah, okay, I think so. You know what? I'm not sure, because, like, I know my mom is not a big fan of marshmallows, but it's not, it's not like a marshmallow
Molly 1:36
thing, okay, my mom, my mom is not a big fan of marshmallows either. So I don't remember her ever making these. I remember, like, other people's moms making these. So I certainly had access to them. Yeah, let's put it that way, yeah. Do you remember when the packaged ones came on the market?
Matthew Amster-Burton 1:55
I do. And like, when I tried to guess when it was, my guess was, it was when I was in junior high way off. They came out in 1995 so I was already in college. Wow.
Molly 2:05
Okay. I mean, I wonder how many kids today, like think of these primarily as a manufactured product, whereas when we were kids, and for most of the existence of a rice krispie treat, it's been something that was only made at
Matthew Amster-Burton 2:19
home. Yeah, I imagine most kids probably think of them as a manufactured product.
Molly 2:23
That's so interesting to me to tell you the truth, I think I've maybe eaten the store bought ones, like, once.
Matthew Amster-Burton 2:30
I've definitely had them more than once, but I don't think as often as homemade ones. Yeah, yeah, just because if I'm looking for a treat at the store, like, that's not gonna be the thing I'm gonna get. I'm gonna get like, a Snickers or M M's.
Molly 2:44
That's a good point. I'm gonna get something that I absolutely cannot make at home, right?
Matthew Amster-Burton 2:48
Yeah, have you tried making M M's at home?
Molly 2:53
Wait, I have a question. So I made these yesterday. We'll talk in a minute about what these are. But anyway, I made these yesterday, and they were so I hadn't had them in a while, and they were so delicious to me that I quickly plowed through like, three of them after dinner. Oh yeah, and they made the roof of my mouth right behind my front teeth hurt. Are they doing that to you? Like, when you bite into it square on after a while? Does the rice kind of like a braid the like right behind your top front teeth.
Matthew Amster-Burton 3:24
They're not even hitting that part of my palate so much I could, I could see the like that they could have, like a Captain Crunch like effect,
Molly 3:31
yeah, my mouth is a little ouchy today because I went so hard on the rice krispie treats last year. Oh, boy. These are so good, aren't they so good? Okay, I love how they do make my fingers just a little bit greasy. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Well, we're going to talk about that, because these are not the originals. In fact, I think probably all of our listeners are familiar with the ones that I made today, which come from the blog smitten kitchen, the fabulous Deb Perlman. And we're going to talk about how different these are from the original in really crucial ways. Okay, so, okay, so these bad boys are made just about as quickly as any dessert you can possibly make, yeah, short of like cutting up some fruit,
Matthew Amster-Burton 4:10
yep, basically as easy as cutting into a passion fruit. That's exactly right.
Molly 4:15
You melt some butter, you stir in some marshmallows, and stir it around until they are kind of melted and gloopy. And then you stir in Rice Krispies, and you work quickly and press it into like an eight by eight or nine by nine pan and let it cool. Yeah.
Matthew Amster-Burton 4:30
That raises an interesting point, which is that these, this is a dessert made from gloop, but it is not a gloop dessert.
Molly 4:36
It is not a gloop dessert. That's right, the gloop Well, it's like you've taken something. It's kind of like, you know how like, Well, I'm just thinking about how it you do the same thing with,
Matthew Amster-Burton 4:47
I think physicists would call this a congealed gloop.
Molly 4:50
Okay, anyway, basically, you take this thing that has a stable form, you take the good and then you melt it, you use it to. Bind together something else, and then together they form a new,
Matthew Amster-Burton 5:04
stable thing, yeah, yeah. Like you, it's like you've created, like, a matrix.
Molly 5:09
It's almost like you've got some, it's like you've got a, okay, you know, the stick that you feed into a hot glue gun. Yes, starts out solid, becomes a gloop, becomes a solid
Matthew Amster-Burton 5:19
again, yeah, no, that is, that is interesting. Like, what other things do we do that have that kind of phase change? Is it just glue guns and Rice Krispies Treats? That reminds me? Are we calling these Rice Krispies Treats, which I think I hate that. So it's Rice Krispie treats. Rice Crispy, right? Like crispy, come at us. Kellogg's, don't actually you could crush us.
Molly 5:42
I have apparently turned it into rights crispy.
Matthew Amster-Burton 5:46
Okay, the Let The Right One crisp.
Molly 5:50
All right. So these guys were invented way earlier than I would have
Matthew Amster-Burton 5:54
thought. Just to be clear, you used marshmallows, not hot glue gun sticks, to make these right.
Molly 5:58
Yeah, okay, yeah, you can use hot glue guns, but it is not edible if you do, yeah,
Matthew Amster-Burton 6:04
I've tried, I've tried various solids, Yankee Candles, ice cubes, like the
Molly 6:12
oatmeal cookie Yankee Candle, when mixed with crisp rice and butter, is really okay. So these guys were invented in 1939 really, yes, by two women who worked for the Kellogg company. Now, Deb Perlman, in her like Recipe Notes, says that they worked in the home economics department of the Kellogg company. Okay, I didn't find anything that specific, but yeah, two Kellogg company employees, Melita Jensen and Mildred. Day they were working at Kellogg in Battle Creek, Michigan,
Matthew Amster-Burton 6:49
okay, as seen in the road to wellville. Oh, I haven't watched that. Is it a good movie? I don't know. Okay, like I enjoyed it. Great.
Molly 6:58
Anyway, as you might imagine, they made it. They made this recipe as a promotional vehicle for the cereal, right? So they presented the recipe as Rice Krispies, Marshmallow treats. And that was what the recipe was first called when it appeared, and it was in newspaper ads as early as November of 1940 Oh, wow. Okay, so the original recipe, get this had a third of a cup butter, so that's what like. It's like five and a third tablespoons, or something, five and a third ounce. No, no, no, you're right. You're right, because a half right, right? So I'm just trying to because, because the amount of butter is going to change. So I want us to kind of keep track of the butter, let's say so, like, a little less than a stick of butter, right? A little more than half a stick of butter, I would say, okay, okay, so the original recipe had a third cup butter, a third cup marshmallow.
Matthew Amster-Burton 7:51
That seems like a tiny amount. I know seems like two marshmallows,
Molly 7:55
I don't understand, and then a half teaspoon of vanilla, and one five and a half ounce package of Rice Krispies.
Matthew Amster-Burton 8:01
I have no sense of how what the volume of a five and a half ounce package of Rice Krispies is. I know they're pretty well light.
Molly 8:08
I can tell you I used how many ounces, six cups of cereal. I don't remember how many ounces, yeah. Anyway, whatever, this recipe seems extremely implausible to me. I, in fact, I read it over a couple times because I was like, really, a third cup marshmallow.
Matthew Amster-Burton 8:26
I feel like you would pick these up, and just like the cereal would all fall off. I think you're right.
Molly 8:31
Well anyway, by 1950 they'd slightly changed the recipe. So they reduced the butter back to a quarter cup, which is half a stick. They increased the marshmallow to half a pound. That is a very large increase, right? Okay, now we're up to eight ounces of marshmallow, okay, half teaspoon of vanilla and five cups of Rice Krispies. But we're getting closer to the current
Matthew Amster-Burton 8:54
official risk. Yeah, I couldn't tell you off the top of my head what the current ratio is, okay, so Michael ruleman Could, obviously, that's
Molly 9:00
right. So by 1955 they had started listing margarine, of course, as an alternative to butter, and they had eliminated the vanilla.
Matthew Amster-Burton 9:09
Yeah, I think this was like a small plot point in Back to the Future. He goes back to 1955 and says, it says this, 1955 is so weird. The Rice Krispie treats recipe is slightly different from today. I kissed my mom again.
Molly 9:33
Okay, wait, hold on. I forgot about that part of Back to the Future. But hang on. What about do you think that marshmallows always had vanilla in them? Like, aren't marshmallows? Like, don't they? Aren't they slightly vanilla flavored?
Matthew Amster-Burton 9:49
Maybe? Like, I think of them as being marshmallow flavored, but I don't know what that is. Okay.
Molly 9:55
Well, anyway, the current recipe is three tablespoons of butter. So even less butter, we're like, just walking the butter back, walking that butter back. And this is from the rice krispies website, 2025, three tablespoons butter, 10 ounces jet puffed marshmallow. So less butter, more Marshmallow, and more cereal. Six cups of cereal.
Matthew Amster-Burton 10:16
Okay, this reminds me of like when I was a kid and you made Kraft macaroni and cheese or Kraft dinner. For our Canadian listeners, the recipe was always put in four tablespoons of butter or margarine. And I think now it says two. It does, I'm pretty sure, right. Yeah, it's better with four.
Molly 10:34
Yeah, what? What is going on here, I mean, and this was, I'm just fascinated that, like, for instance, between 1940 and 1950 they started cutting the butter,
Matthew Amster-Burton 10:44
yeah? Like, I mean, I don't, I don't even know if, like, I think probably it got better, the recipe got better, that it's like, better when it's mostly marshmallows. Yeah, is my, is my guess. But I would be curious. I feel like the third cup of marshmallows is just a mistake, but I don't
Molly 11:03
know. I don't know. So the recipe we're eating today is the famous smitten kitchen salted brown butter, crispy treat. All right? She uses 10 ounces of marshmallows. That's the same as the rice krispies recipe. She uses six cups of crisp rice cereal, same as the rice krispies recipe, but then she takes the butter up to one stick. Wow. So, so that's almost three times what's in.
Matthew Amster-Burton 11:32
Oh, that's why my fingers get a little Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Molly 11:35
And, of course, she has you brown that butter, and then she also has you add a heaping quarter teaspoon of crunchy sea salt. I used Malden, that's my favorite salt, and she has you stir that in with the rice krispies. So I would also say word to the wise, if you've never made these, I would use something as large as like, a five and a half quart dutch oven, because, well, my dutch oven is pretty it is perfect for it, because it's light in color. It's like off white and Amster, yeah, so you can see the butter Brown. But then when you add the marshmallow, you've got plenty of space to stir it around. And then when you add six cups of crisp rice cereal, you need a lot of space, yeah, stir that stuff. So you don't want to be doing this in like, a two quart saucepan. No. And I feel like recipes don't really drive that home quite enough.
Matthew Amster-Burton 12:27
Yeah, I know what you mean. I had this experience recently where I was trying to mix stuff up in a too small bowl, and this wasn't, I'm not blaming a recipe. This was my mistake. But is there anything more frustrating that moment where you're like, I'm trying to stir this up and like, it's at the very top of the bowl, and things are gonna slosh out. But like, do I get out a whole other bowl and dump this in? I already got this bowl dirty? Like, Yep, yeah, life is hard. Life is so hard.
Molly 12:59
The other thing that I would say is these recipes, they don't tend to specify whether they want you to use big, like, small size marshmallows or mini ones. I have found over the years, I way prefer the mini ones because it's easier to get them to
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:14
melt. Oh, but I do, I do kind of like that when the when the big ones are kind of half melted, and you see those, like, like, sort of like, slippery like, lumps, slippery lumps.
Molly 13:24
Yeah, you'll still see the slippery lumps smaller, but it's I find it easier to find them or to, you know, whatever. I'm fascinated that the original recipe uses no salt, and it makes me wish that I had tasted it recently,
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:38
maybe back then, Rice Krispies were really salty.
Molly 13:41
I'm sure that's it, that I'm sure that's it. But I feel like everybody I know, who's ever made this version the brown butter one with salt? Oh, you never goes back. Yeah, yeah. It's the best. It is the best. Matthew, have you ever made these?
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:56
Yeah, absolutely. Do I make them often? No. Like Watson is more of the baker in the family, and, like, if she doesn't make them that often either, and if she does, she's gonna make these, or one that I'm gonna talk about in just a minute. But, yeah, I've certainly made
Molly 14:10
them. If you're in like, a coffee shop or something like that that is selling baked goods, would you ever buy these?
Matthew Amster-Burton 14:18
Probably not, like, something about, like, you know, I feel like I'd be concerned that they were, like, sitting there wrapped in plastic for a long time and are going to be stale.
Molly 14:28
And I feel like, because it's so easy and fast to make them at home,
Matthew Amster-Burton 14:33
I want to get something that I can't easily whip up at home.
Molly 14:38
Yeah, it's interesting. I wonder, yeah, if I'm, if I'm looking for a baked good in a bakery, I don't tend to go rice krispie treat.
Matthew Amster-Burton 14:46
Have you ever sculpted with these? Because I've noticed on on Great British Bake Off, sometimes when they have like a sculpted like, you know, make a like a bust of your favorite author that's edible, which they really did do something like that once. Well. One thing that they'll use to sculpt is they'll, like, make a big batch of these and, like, kind of pile them up with a dowel, and then, like, start slicing.
Molly 15:07
I never thought of that. Yeah, wait a minute. So hold on. They will make, basically, like, a block from it, and then chisel from the block. Like, like, Michelangelo,
Matthew Amster-Burton 15:17
exactly what Michelangelo used to do, yes, he used almost no butter back then.
Molly 15:24
And he was using, like, I don't
Matthew Amster-Burton 15:26
know, wheat berries, lots of butter and no marshmallows. There we go. Okay, yeah, we use wheat berries instead of, instead of rice krispie treats, borrow or, yeah, some ancient grains. Yes, yeah. He used a mix of commute, beef tallow, amaranth.
Molly 15:44
And, okay, wait, but hold on, so I just want to get back to the grape.
Matthew Amster-Burton 15:52
That's what David is made of. That's why people are always trying to eat him at the museum.
Molly 15:56
And that's why it's so remarkable how smooth, like the texture of him is, like, when you, when you
Matthew Amster-Burton 16:02
lick it, that's, that's the talent
Molly 16:06
so hard, there's so much fiber that's true. Anyway, anyway, okay, but wait, hold on. So just to make sure I'm getting this straight, so in the Great British Bake Off, it wasn't that they took, like, the warm rice krispie treat mix before it had set and sculpted, that it was that they,
Matthew Amster-Burton 16:32
I think, kind of both. I think, I think they like, like trying to, like, get it into, like, the rough, rough dimensions. But then, no, they, they're like, cutting bits off of it. It's very satisfying to watch. I wouldn't want to try and do it.
Molly 16:47
Sounds very stressful. I am fascinated by this. I've only heard of, like, you know, butter sculptures.
Matthew Amster-Burton 16:52
Yeah, no, they sculpt a bunch of things. Like, what else I don't know. Sometimes they just, like, stack up a bunch of cakes and then put fondant
Molly 17:00
over it. Oh yeah, there's always the old fondant. The old fondant, yep. Okay, well, Matthew, what's the other thing that Laurie makes?
Matthew Amster-Burton 17:08
Have you ever heard of Scotch or ruse? No, okay, I hadn't either. I think I don't know if Watts had heard about them before this, and was just like inspired to make them. But I think they appeared in like a Sarah Kiefer dessert cookbook. And what they are, they are popular in the American Midwest, and were a rice krispies back in the box recipe in the 60s. You make peanut butter Rice Krispie treats, then top them with a butterscotch layer and a chocolate layer. And so the peanut butter is like, infused within the Rice Krispies Treats, and they've got, like, a thin butterscotch layer and a thin chocolate layer, really tasty, like just peanut butter rice crispy treats, also really tasty. Wow. Okay, I just melt, you just melt, like some peanut butter in with the butter. I think
Molly 17:51
it never occurred to me to want to flavor these, but I can see how that would be so good.
Matthew Amster-Burton 17:57
Yeah, I don't think I've tried any flavors other than brown butter or peanut butter, like there probably are some other ones that would
Molly 18:05
be good. And what form is the butterscotch in? In the scotch, I'm trying
Matthew Amster-Burton 18:09
to remember, maybe we can find the book. Okay, yes, this is in 100 cookies by Sarah Keefer. It's on page 215 Oh, look at these beauties. Oh, wow. Okay, so it is melted butterscotch chips. Okay, so I'm sure that was the original back of the box also. Oh, totally okay. Why not?
Molly 18:26
All right, wow. Okay, maybe we'll look and see if we can find it online.
Matthew Amster-Burton 18:30
I bet we can. Like, if not, if not the Sarah kefir recipe, then I'm sure, like, the Kellogg's like corporate recipe is, is on their website, and I'm sure is very good, awesome.
Molly 18:39
Wow. Do we have anything else to say about Rice Krispie treats?
Matthew Amster-Burton 18:43
I don't think so. I like that. These have never gone out of style, kind of that
Molly 18:49
there's something that is like one of those products that is just made with, like convenience foods and was designed to sell a product, but it's genuinely delicious.
Matthew Amster-Burton 19:00
Yeah, I feel like this is something that's sort of pefp adjacent, kind of because, like, I don't, I don't know if I would give the pefp perfectly engineered food product designation to the store bought, like packaged Rice Krispie treats, because I think they're not as good as homemade. But the homemade ones, which take no effort, are perfect in their own
Molly 19:21
way. Well, I think I would say specifically. Deb Perlman, yeah, that's the smitten kitchen, but I'm
Matthew Amster-Burton 19:25
never gonna say no to the original one. Like, you know, like, Are they as interesting? No, but, like, it's mostly about that, you know, Chewy, marshmallowy texture along with the crispy rice texture.
Molly 19:36
Yeah, yeah. Matthew, hey, what's your snacking?
Speaker 1 19:40
Hey, watch your snacking. You gotta tell me what you're snacking, or I'll release the cracking. So what you snacking?
Matthew Amster-Burton 19:52
I'm so glad you asked. I'm gonna go get what I'm snacking.
Molly 19:55
Okay, oh, man, Matthew, you told me about these.
Matthew Amster-Burton 19:59
Okay. So. What we have here. I saw these at owajimaya, and I initially walked by them. I'm like, I'm not gonna buy this latest gimmicky chip. These Qingdao lager beer flavored potato chips that are imported from China and are a collaboration between Lay's and the Qingdao beer museum. So I wanna see your reaction to eating this
Molly 20:21
chip. Oh, my god. Uh huh. That is so weird.
Matthew Amster-Burton 20:25
Matthew, it's it is the most perfectly successful attempt to put a flavor into a potato chip I've ever tasted. But it's kind of gross. I love it really, okay. It even has the aftertaste of beer.
Molly 20:41
Matthew, You know what I feel like. I can only describe this by doing it on the terms of the three course meal bubble gum from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Okay, all right, so this first hits your mouth, and it feels like it almost fizzes on your tongue, like the head of a good cold beer. Okay, I really feel the fizz. It almost has a sweet quality to it. Does it fizzes, then you start to chew on it, and you get, like, beer flavor, like, then there's like a little whisper of potato that comes in, but it is primarily crunchy beer, and now that I have swallowed it, yes, it feels like I just took a sip of beer. It's got, like, a hoppy aftertaste. It has a hoppy aftertaste. And what is bizarre to me is, whatever it does, is it MSG, like the way it like blooms, this beer
Matthew Amster-Burton 21:33
flavor, it does have MSG, but there's, there's more to it than that,
Molly 21:37
okay? I don't love that, okay? And I also think it's brilliant.
Matthew Amster-Burton 21:41
I love it. The reason I ended up deciding to get it was because I used to love the kettle chips, cheddar beer flavor, and I thought they might be kind of like those. They're not. But my, yeah, my first, my first Chip, I was like, Oh, this is amazing. But like, do I actually like it? And then I was like, No, I I'm gonna, like, eat this whole bag. And I did,
Molly 22:00
wow, okay, I like it,
Speaker 2 22:06
okay, yeah, I think, I think if you, if you like potato chips, and you like beer, and you run into these, definitely give them a try. Oh, they're fascinating. They're totally worth a try. Molly, do you have any now? But wow, I do you
Molly 22:26
so my now, but wow, is the documentary Omar and Cedric. Oh, okay. It is called Omar and Cedric. If this ever gets weird, the subtitle and it is a documentary of the two musicians who make up at the core the band The Mars Volta. Prior to that, they were in at the drive in so Cedric Bixler, Zavala and Omar Rodriguez, Lopez, I come to them as a fan of the Mars Volta album. D loused in the culatorium. This band is I've seen them live twice, and it I think it's a quite polarizing experience. Oh, sure, either you love it or it just seems like you're watching a circle jerk, because they are just so go in on their own stuff. Yeah, the music is complex and really challenging. And I had always heard that the two of them were really challenging. They both have struggled with addiction. I loved this documentary. I stayed up really late on Saturday night watching it. It is, more than anything, an incredibly compelling portrait of a friendship. Oh, so it's like frog and toad are prog rocker. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. It's got voice overs, or sort of, it's narrated kind of, by both of them. I would say it's a little bit more Omar's show, but the way that their friendship is portrayed is, I would say, a very non heteronormative. Oh, that's great brotherhood that these two have, like a true love for one another, like as soul mates, even though, as far as I understand, they've never romantically been together, but it was just they're clearly both brilliant. There are definitely moments when I felt embarrassed that we were being shown the footage that they had made together, being idiots, but it was just a beautiful portrait of a friendship with a lot of really amazing, complex music. So okay, yeah, yeah, that's Omar and Cedric. If this ever gets weird, and you can look up and stream it in any number of places,
Matthew Amster-Burton 24:34
great. All right, our producer is Abby circatella, who never lets us get weird,
Molly 24:40
never, never. You can rate and review us wherever you get podcasts
Matthew Amster-Burton 24:45
and you can talk to other spilled milk listeners at reddit.com/r/everything, spilled milk, where this time you'll probably be weighing in on, like, I don't know, like, what weird flavor did you put in your rice krispie treats? Yeah, maybe you're from Kellogg's corporate. It, and you're and you're coming to shut us down because we didn't call them Rice Krispies Treats.
Molly 25:04
Or maybe you, maybe you are a grandchild of Mildred day. I would love to know more about Melita, or Melita Jensen and Mildred day. So hey, so yeah, if
Matthew Amster-Burton 25:16
you're out there, if you're still working at Kellogg's 85 years later, get on the Reddit. Reddit.com/r/everything, spilled milk, or send us an email contact at spilled milk podcast.com. We accept emails from beyond the grave. We sure do. Thanks for listening. I'm the jet puff marshmallow man,
Molly 25:35
and I'm Snapple crack. No,
Matthew Amster-Burton 25:42
don't say anything else your snap will crack. See you next time
Matthew Amster-Burton 25:54
I'm all in one, wow, we contain multitudes. I.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai