Gingerbread Muddy Buddies (Puppy Chow)

Jump to Recipe Print Recipe

These gingerbread muddy buddies have all the satisfying and craveable elements of the classic sweet snack combined with the festive flavors of gingerbread. Packed with the bold, warm notes of ginger, molasses, and peanut butter and showered in powdered sugar, this recipe is a unique and fun holiday treat. It includes fresh and crystallized ginger for a double dose of gingery goodness and molasses for a rich, sticky, caramel-like depth. For a playful twist, we’ve included Teddy Grahams (adorable stand-ins for gingerbread people), Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and sprinkles for added flare.

This is a great sweet snack to share with friends or eat all by yourself while watching your favorite holiday movie!

Green bowl full of gingerbread muddy buddies with chex, pretzels, teddy grahams, ginger, and sprinkles. Jar of molasses in the background.

Why You’ll Crave These Gingerbread Muddy Buddies

Familiar treat with unexpected flavors. If you grew up eating muddy buddies, then you’ll recognize this treat! We’ve kept some things the same, but we’ve added some ginger and molasses to give these serious gingerbread vibes. It has the same familiar, craveworthy crunch, but with a twist.
Super customizable. Don’t like pretzels or Teddy Grahams? Skip them and use all Chex instead. Or use whatever you want!
Tastes like a gingerbread house but is much easier to make! This has the traditional gingerbread flavors of rich molasses and ginger but requires exactly zero baking time. It hits all the right notes of gingerbread but is so much easier to make.
Festive but not your standard holiday treat. We love peppermint as much as the next person (we do make a Peppermint Fudge, after all), but sometimes, you just want something festive that isn’t covered in candy canes. This is a fun, non-minty holiday treat and a great way to reinvent gingerbread.
Fun to share with people and give as gifts. Like most muddy buddy recipes, this one makes a lot, so go ahead and share some with your loved ones! We sometimes like to package it up into little individual gift bags for our friends too.

Green bowl on black table full of gingerbread muddy buddies with chex, pretzels, teddy grahams, ginger, and sprinkles.

What are Muddy Buddies (aka Puppy Chow)?

Muddy buddies, which are also sometimes called “puppy chow,” “monkey munch,” or even “reindeer chow,” is a snack traditionally made with Chex cereal that gets coated in a wet mixture of melted butter, melted chocolate, and peanut butter and an avalanche of powdered sugar. It’s an easy snack that you can make with kids and requires no baking, freeing up your oven for other holiday cookies and treats. We’ve changed things up by adding molasses and fresh ginger to the wet mixture and replacing the traditional semisweet or milk chocolate with white chocolate. We’ve also added more dry mix-ins with the Chex for additional flavors and textures.

Ingredients in Gingerbread Muddy Buddies

Butter – we recommend salted because these muddy buddies are pretty sweet.
Molasses – for deep sweet notes and gingerbread flavor.
Peanut butter – for classic muddy buddy vibes. Use unsweetened peanut butter to keep this sweet snack from becoming even sweeter.
Ginger – use freshly grated and crystallized ginger for sweet peppery flavor.
Vanilla extract – this rounds out the flavor.
White chocolate – for sweet, creamy notes.
Chex and other mix-ins – we like using corn Chex, pretzel squares, Teddy Grahams (they look like gingerbread people!), and Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal.
Powdered sugar – this ingredient is vital and coats everything in a light, snowy layer.
Sprinkles – this makes the treat super fun and festive. Bonus points for sprinkles shaped like gingerbread people!

Close up of gingerbread muddy buddies showing crunchy snack mix coated in ginger mixture and powdered sugar.

How to Make Gingerbread Muddy Buddies

Add just the Chex and the pretzels to a large bowl or storage container with a lid or a large zip-top bag.
Melt butter in a small sauce pan over medium heat. Add the salt, ginger, molasses, and peanut butter, stirring until fully combined with the butter. Add in the chopped white chocolate and stir until melted, then remove from the heat and mix in the vanilla.
Pour the wet mixture over the Chex and pretzels and mix gently with a large spoon. Note: we find that a metal spoon works best because it’s less bulky than wood or silicone and won’t crush the cereal.
Sprinkle in half of the powdered sugar, mix carefully with the spoon until the Chex and pretzels are mostly coated, then add the rest of the sugar.
Cover the bowl with the lid or zip up the bag and shake until the cereal is fully coated with the powdered sugar.
Remove the lid or unzip the bag, add the Teddy Grahams, Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal, crystallized ginger, and sprinkles, and stir everything together.

Grid of 4 images showing gingerbread muddy buddies being made, from the wet ingredients in a pot, pouring over dry snacks, and powdered sugar on top.

Our Tips for Making Muddy Buddies

Rachel and Emily from Cooking with Conks

Make sure you use a big enough bowl to mix everything in. One with a lid works even better because you can shake up the muddy buddies and store them, all in the same place.
Chop the chocolate small so it melts quickly. The chocolate needs to melt into the peanut butter and molasses mixture before it gets too cold. Chopping the chocolate small helps ensure even melting and mixing.

Coat only the Chex and pretzels in the wet mixture and powdered sugar first. The Teddy Grahams and Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal are already seasoned with sugar and honey flavor, so we like to add them with the crystallized ginger and sprinkles at the end. They’ll still get coated in powdered sugar, but this lets the less sweet Chex and pretzels get the majority of the sugar flavor.

Storage and Serving Suggestions

We like to serve these snacks at room temperature. They’re a great sweet treat to share with friends and family this holiday season. We like putting out a big bowl of them on holiday movie nights. We’re pretty sure Buddy the Elf would approve!

You can store these muddy buddies in an alright container at room temperature for up to 3 to 4 days before they start to get stale. If you want to keep them around a little longer, we suggest placing them in the fridge for 1 to 2 weeks, or freezing them for up to 3 months.

Green bowl on black table full of gingerbread snack mix with chex, pretzels, and colorful festive sprinkles.

FAQs: Gingerbread Muddy Buddies

You can make this recipe gluten free by choosing gluten-free mix-ins. Most Chex brand cereal is gluten-free already, so you can substitute that for the other mix-ins and just use all Chex, or add some gluten-free pretzels too. Molasses, butter, unsweetened peanut butter, ginger, and powdered sugar are naturally gluten-free, but be sure to check the brand labels for any potential cross-contamination.

You can use a storage container (like Tupperware) with a lid, or even a large ziptop bag!

You really can’t taste the white chocolate in this snack. It just adds sweetness, volume, and creamy richness to the muddy buddies. If you absolutely don’t want white chocolate, though, you can use milk chocolate or semisweet, but the deeper chocolate flavor may overshadow the gingerbread notes.

No, you could skip them or use crushed up candies instead. We like to use festive sprinkles for this recipe (because they’re fun!), but any kind will do.

Close up of gingerbread muddy buddies showing snack mix coated in ginger mixture and powdered sugar, with red, green, and white sprinkles.

Ingredients

Gingerbread Coating

4 tbsp butter
¼ cup molasses
¼ cup unsweetened creamy peanut butter
1 ½ tsp freshly grated ginger
¼ tsp sea salt
½ tsp vanilla extract
4 ounces white chocolate chopped

Dry Mix-Ins

5 cups Chex cereal
2 cups pretzel squares
1 ½ cups powdered sugar
1 cup Teddy Grahams
1 cup Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal
¾ cup chopped crystallized ginger
¼ cup sprinkles

Instructions

Add just the Chex and the pretzels to a large bowl or storage container with a lid or a large zip-top bag.
5 cups Chex cereal, 2 cups pretzel squares
Melt butter in a small sauce pan over medium heat. Add the salt, ginger, molasses, and peanut butter, stirring until fully combined with the butter. Add in the chopped white chocolate and stir until melted, then remove from the heat and mix in the vanilla.
4 tbsp butter, ¼ cup molasses, ¼ cup unsweetened creamy peanut butter, 1 ½ tsp freshly grated ginger, ¼ tsp sea salt, ½ tsp vanilla extract, 4 ounces white chocolate
Pour the wet mixture over the Chex and pretzels and mix gently with a large spoon. Note: we find that a metal spoon works best because it’s less bulky than wood or silicone and won’t crush the cereal.
Sprinkle in half of the powdered sugar, mix carefully with the spoon until the Chex and pretzels are mostly coated, then add the rest of the sugar.
Cover the bowl with the lid or zip up the bag and shake until the cereal is fully coated with the powdered sugar.
Remove the lid or unzip the bag, add the Teddy Grahams, Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal, crystallized ginger, and sprinkles, and stir everything together.

Final Thoughts

We love a good snack mix (check out our Homemade Ranch Snack Mix for a savory option), and this is a fun one to pull out during the holidays, or whenever you crave gingerbread. It’s unique and a fun addition to any cookie gift box. If you love these as much as we do, let us know! We’d love to hear from you in the comments below, on Instagram, or other socials.