Unicorn Crispy Squares

I am a little sad summer is all but over but I have to admit I am more of an Autumn person.
I will miss all the amazing food festivals that we have gone to this summer. We went to one almost every weekend last month. If you follow me on Instagram you may have seen a couple of pictures from them. Here's a round up of the best we found!

The Vegan Food Festival in Westerpark (@veganfoodfestivals) was brilliant for some plant based food. There we had some awesome doughnuts from The Donut Dude (@donutdudeamsterdam) - if you get to try one go for the Lemon Thyme it was delicious!!! We didn't just fill our faces with sweet stuff though, I also had a great 'fish' burger from Vivera (@vivavivera) and my Husband had a Shoarma which was hands down one of the best I've ever tasted and it was totally meat free. Husband is a total carnivore but even he was nearly fooled by the shoarma which was actually soy based. I don't think he'll ever be converted to becoming a vegetarian (neither will I to be honest) but products like that make Meat Free Monday's a whole lot more exciting.

Terrassen Festival (@amsterdamseterrassenfestival) in Rembrandtpark had many of Amsterdam's bars and restaurants there with stands for food and drink. The weather was abysmal but a beer in hand and Takoyaki from Vatten Ramen (@vattenramenkerkstraat) was the perfect way to watch the rain come down. The same weekend we hit ProefPark Food Truck Festival in Haarlem (@proefparkhaarlem) where we had an amazing tandoori chicken naan from Joeri Tandoeri (@joeritandoeri). The naan was made fresh in front of you in a mobile tandoori oven the traditional way by sticking the stretched dough to the inside of the oven and removing it with a hook. We also had duck 5 ways from a truck called Duck & More (I couldn't find their Instagram to tag them) and to avoid fighting we got a tamales and quesadilla from Dos Chicas (@doschicas_nl). I had always wanted to try a tamales. I've seen them made on TV and read about them in books but never had a go myself. This was fantastic - soft masa filled with chicken and served with HOT salsa, sour cream, guacamole and a fresh corn salsa too. The quesadilla was also divine. The chicken filling was smokey and delicious with lots of cheese and a crunchy tortilla. All this was washed down with beer from a local Haarlem brewery Uiltje (@uiltjecraftbeer). We had the strawberry milk stout (sounds weird but it was amazing!) and the pineapple weizen - delicious day drinking!

That brings us to last weekend when we visited Dok (@dokamsterdam) for their food truck festival. We started with a minced beef and jalapeno quesadilla from De Grillende Keukenmeiden (@grillendekeukenmeiden) with lots of sour cream and green chilli Sriracha which I could have eaten a dozen of! Bao buns from Karakter (@barkarakter) were ok. The crab cake was a little disappointing as it was bloody tiny and not very crabby but the pulled BBQ chicken was better and the actual bao buns themselves were light as a feather!

So this week I have made something in a theme that once upon a time would have only been seen at a seven year olds birthday party or perhaps at a tea party with Dame Edna but now is all the rage. 

I'm talking Unicorn people!!! 

Embrace your inner child and your love for all that is pink and sparkles and make yourself a batch of these!! The best thing is you can be as over the top as you like with the decoration - more is more!!!
The general rule of thumb for a unicorn theme - pastel colours, gold and silver highlights, glitter and sparkles. You can add neon colours for highlights. Pink is a good base. Think My Little Pony.
I hate to jump on a band wagon but you can't go anywhere without seeing unicorn t-shirts, mugs, pencil cases and the unicorn food trend apparently started when a blogger made multicoloured cream cheese and put it on toast. Now you can make just about everything 'unicorn' - bagels, cake, sushi, I've even seen a unicorn cheese toasty. New brands like Sweetapolita have grown out of this trend and big brands, like Starbucks, have jumped on the bandwagon too when they made their Unicorn Frappacino.

The basic recipe is super simple - just 3 ingredients - unsalted butter, puffed rice and marshmallows. From there you can add as much to them as you like. 

When I say puffed rice you can obviously use Rice Krispies. I didn't have any when I made these, because my local supermarket didn't have any, but they did have puffed rice which is slightly less crunchy and somewhat more popcorn like in texture. Still delicious! If you are puzzled looking for sugar coated puffed rice simply pick up a big bag of Rainbow Drops. They're total nostalgia for me and I didn't realise they have been around since World War 2!!

You may want to stay away from anything you have to add colour or flavour to and thats fine but these are called unicorn for a reason and it's part of the magic. To colour your mix always go for gel food colourings as you don't need as much, they don't dilute your mix and the colours are usually much more vibrant. I used Sugarflair's Gel Colouring in Claret.
I wanted a raspberry flavour, but you can stick to the unadulterated marshmallow vanilla if you like. To get that flavour I added both freeze dried raspberry powder and raspberry flavouring. You don't have to use the raspberry flavouring but it does help strengthen the flavour. I used Foodie Flavours (@foodie_flavours) because it is natural and vegan.

UNICORN MARSHMALLOW CRISPY SQUARES
Makes 15

Ingredients

50g Unsalted Butter
300g Marshmallows
130g Rice Krispies or Plain Puffed Rice
60g Sugar Coated Puffed Rice
30g Multi Coloured Mini Marshmallows
1 tsp Freeze Dried Raspberry Powder
5 drops Raspberry Flavour (optional)
Pink Food Colouring Gel

To Decorate

50g White Chocolate
1 tsp Milk
1 Packet Popping Candy
As many sprinkles, edible glitter and dragees (those little multi coloured balls) as your heart desires!

• Well oil and line the bottom of a 27 x 18 baking tray with baking parchment.
• In a large pan melt the butter over a low heat and add the marshmallows. Use a silicon spatula to stir constantly until the marshmallows have melted. 
• Add the food colouring (I used an amount about the size of one of the gold dragees), freeze dried raspberry powder and flavouring, if using, and stir quickly to incorporate. 
• Take off the heat and add add the puffed rice, sugar coated rice and mini marshmallows mixing until it is all covered in the melted marshmallow mix
• Tip the mixture into your prepared tray and press down. TOP TIP - oil your hands before you press the mixture down because until it is set it is like pink tar and sticks to everything.
• Melt the white chocolate and milk together in a bowl in short 20 second blasts in the microwave stirring well in between until smooth. Drizzle over the surface of the crispy mix.
• Whilst the chocolate is still warm sprinkle over the popping candy and as many sprinkles and glitter as you want.
• Leave for half an hour or so to set before running a knife around the edge to release it, removing the parchment from the bottom and cutting into squares.
• Store in an air tight container. Should keep well for a week. TOP TIP - Cut strips of baking parchment to wrap round the crispy squares to stop them from sticking to the storage box and each other.

I've had a little bit of a change up so now if you want too follow me on Instagram you can find me @_cooknoevil_ and simply typing www.cooknoevil.co.uk will bring you here to the blog!