Nutella Puppy Chow

Cricket is a funny creature.  In case you don't know, Cricket is our Sheltie, aka strange hairy little pooch that lives with us.  I didn't grow up having dogs, so raising her from a tiny little fuzzball has been quite the experience.

But let me tell you.  I'm a total believer.  Having a dog is almost indescribable.  Nothing else in this world will ever love you the way a dog does.  No matter what you do, you always get to come home to that wagging tail, and let me tell you.  There is nothing better.

Now Cricket, like anyone, has her quirks and eccentricities.  If we're eating rotisserie chicken for dinner and she's lucky enough to get a morsel, she gulps it down like a seagull, and I refuse to believe that she could possibly be tasting anything.  Another of her favorites is cookie dough.  She knows what it means when the apron goes on and I bust out the stand mixer.  She stands at my feet, looking alternately up at me and then down at the ground just in case something dropped that she might have missed.

But veggies?  No way.  She'll take them like she's going to at least try them and then I find them an hour later, slightly chewed and discarded on the floor somewhere.

If Cricket got ahold of this puppy chow, though...oh buddy.  I don't think she'd ever eat her kibble again.

Puppy chow, also known in certain regions as "muddy buddies" (funny how that sounds more gross to me than puppy chow), is basically Chex cereal covered with chocolate, peanut butter, and dusted in powdered sugar.  But everybody knows that, right?

Let's class it up a little, what do you say?  And what's classier than Nutella?  Nothing.  Also, it's worth mentioning that this is a peanut butter-hater friendly recipe.  That part...totally not on purpose but it works.

Nutella Puppy Chow
(adapted from healthy tasty chow)

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1 cup Nutella
3/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
3/4 cup white chocolate chips
3/4 cup hazelnuts
1 box( (14oz or 13 cups) Chex cereal
3 cups powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350 and line a cookie sheet with foil.  Place hazelnuts on cookie sheet and bake for about 8 minutes.  Remove from oven and allow to cool a few minutes before rolling in a clean dish towel to remove skin.  Grind finely in a food processor and set aside.

Pour the cereal into a large bowl.  Set aside.

In a medium sauce pan over med-low heat, melt together the butter, chocolate, and white chocolate chips, stirring constantly.  

Once the chocolate chip mixture is smooth, remove from heat.  Stir in Nutella until smooth.  Add hazelnuts, stirring to incorporate.

Pour chocolate mixture over the cereal.  Using your hands (this part is very messy), carefully stir the cereal to evenly distribute the chocolate over the cereal.  Be careful not to break too much of the cereal, but if you break some it's ok.  

Spoon the chocolate covered cereal into a large plastic Ziploc bag and pour in powdered sugar, 1 cup at a time.  Shake the bag really well to distribute the sugar.  Keep adding powdered sugar 1/2 cup at a time until cereal is mostly white in color.  Don't cover too thickly, you don't want the powdered sugar to be overpowering.