A new twist on an old favorite!

"Necessity is the mother of invention" - Recognize that quote?  It's from "Little Women", and it's so true! 

The girls and I wanted to make s'mores tonight - we had cooked some chicken on the grill (Lou is gone fishing, so I tried my hand at grilling chicken - it didn't turn out so well, but that's a story for another time), so we already had hot coals - s'mores here we come!  Well, it turned out that we had the mashmallows and the chocolate, but no graham crackers - not even a decent cookie to substitute - bummer.  I was trying to think of somoething we could use when I thought of the ice cream cones that we had, and - EUREKA!!!  I had it!

"S'MORE ICE CREAM CONES"

Pure genius, I know.

These suckers were GOOD, not just "oh well, this will do for this time" - I'm talking GO-OD (yes, good enough to be stretched out into two syllables).  Even better than I thought they would be.  You should try them yourself - even if you have the graham crackers, set them aside, whip out your ice cream cones and give these a try.

Here's what you need to make them:

 

Yes, you need the Giant Roasters (they are the jumbo size), cuz one regular s'more marshmallow aint gonna cut it here.  If you don't have the giant roasters, you will need to roaster about 3-4 normal ones to make this work.

CHOCOLATE!!!

You can use any kind of ice cream cone, obviously - this is just the kind I have around the house all the time, cuz they're cheap.

Here's how you make them:

1.  Take your cones (however many you need), and set them out so they are ready to go.

2.  Break off three small squares (okay, they are actually rectangle shape, but whatever) of a Hershey's chocolate bar for each cone.  Place two rectangles in the bottom of each cone, set the remainder aside for later use.

3.  Roast your marshmallows (one jumbo per cone).  IMPORTANT:  These marshmallows MUST BE MELTED ALL THE WAY THROUGH or this will not work as well or taste as good as it should.  So don't go burnin' your marshmallows and havin' the middle all raw.  If they cook too quickly on the outside, just hold them higher up above the coals so that they continue to get all melty in the middle without cooking anymore on the outside.  When the marshmallow starts sliding down the stick/roaster, you'll know it's done.  This is marshmallow roasting 101. :)

4.  Take each thoroughly melted marshmallow and stuff it into the prepared cones as quickly as possible (try not to burn your fingers on the hot sugar!), and while you are stuffing, take one rectangle of the remaining chocolate you set aside earlier and stuff it into the center of the marshmallow, then keep shoving the whole mess into the cone as well as you can.  If you are thinking "boy that sounds messy" - you're right, it is, but soooo worth it.  Have a wet washcloth nearby to wipe your hands off afterward, if you want.  

5.  EAT your gooey, chocolatey, heavenly mess!!!   

Check this baby out - tell me it doesn't look yummy... (actually, it kinda looks like melted ice cream in this picture, but you know what it is, so cut me a break here)

This is what the center looks like once you start eating it - delicious, warm melted chocolate, gooey melted marshmallow and nice crisp, crunchy cone - all perfectly proportioned to one another in taste and texture.  Again - genius, I am.

You know what is the BEST part about these?  Even though the construction is a bit messy (the marshmallow stuffing part, anyway), these are WAY less messy for kids to eat!  All the mess is contained inside the cone!  No falling out of the graham cracker and dripping down their clothes or falling to the ground.  AND the chocolate melts WAY better than it does with the traditonal graham cracker (I think because it is insultated inside the cone and thus gets way hotter from the hot marshmallow with no outside air coming in to cool it down) .  And the taste is sooooo good.  I think I may actually like these better than traditional s'mores - better melting and more flavor.

So try these next time you're making s'mores and let me know what you think!  My kids went nuts for them!