One of my favorite flavor combinations is cinnamon and chocolate. During my college days, I spent most of my paychecks on giant bags of chocolate covered cinnamon bears from the BYU book store. They are the BEST. I had those flavors in mind when I set out to make a munchable-sharable-irresistible treat with those same flavors. This sweet coated popcorn is studded with crushed red hots for bursts of cinnamon and crushed Oreo cookies for a crunchy, crumbly, chocolaty bite. I like to top mine with a little drizzle of semi-sweet or dark chocolate and a sprinkle of sea salt. This Cinnamon Cookie Crunch Popcorn is good any time of the year, but especially fun for Valentine festivities!
Ingredients Needed
- Popcorn – Natural or lightly salted works best. You’ll notice my kernels here are large and round, and that’s because I use Mushroom Popcorn. I just get it on Amazon!
- Almond bark – Also known as vanilla flavored candy coating.
- Oreo cookies – You’ll also need your crushed oreos. I’ve found I get a much better texture when I actually chop the cookies up finely with a large knife (as opposed to trying to also smash with a hammer).
- Cinnamon flavored oil – You can use extract, but be aware that like in our Peppermint Bark Popcorn, it can cause the mixture to seize. It’s actually not a huge problem, it just looks scary. If it turns clumpy just pour it on the popcorn real fast and mix it all up. Cinnamon oil on the other hand is stronger with a crisper cinnamon flavor and it will stay nice and smooth and mix right in so if you can, use it over extract. You can find oils at kitchen supply stores, or at craft stores near the candy making supplies, or right here on Amazon– that’s the brand I use. I just love cinnamon so I like the extra pop of flavor, but I’m sure this would still be yummy without it!
- Semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips
- Kosher salt
- Red hots candies – I’m a huge fan of red hots. I personally think they’re totally unappreciated. I’m noticing they’re not carried as much by grocery stores, especially in February, so if you have trouble finding them, try Walgreens. My Walgreens carries them year round in boxes and I believe other similar drug stores would as well.
Since we don’t want to break our teeth here, we’re going to smash up those candies. Put them in a zip top bag and then give them a good whack with a meat mallet or hammer or something.
How to Make Cinnamon Cookie Crunch Popcorn
- I like to put all my dry ingredients in a bowl so they’re ready to go. Add your popcorn, red hots and cookies to the biggest bowl you have. My absolute FAVORITE bowl is this giant one. It makes mixing popcorn recipes so easy! It’s the same bowl I talked about and showed you in my recent Strawberry Rice Krispie recipe.
- Then you’ll just pour some almond bark over the popcorn. Almond bark has nothing to do with almonds, it’s simply white candy coating, similar to white chocolate.
- Once the mixture is poured on the popcorn and stirred well to coat it all, spread out the popcorn on a big cookie sheet that’s been lined with foil, parchment, or a silicone baking mat and drizzle a little chocolate over the top.
- After that, give everything a light sprinkle of kosher or sea salt. That’s a step some people skip on sweet recipes, but don’t! It balances out the flavors and enhances everything! Most sweet things are better with salt. I like sea salt on popcorn recipes, but kosher salt works great, too. My favorite is the little chunks of chocolate with flaked salt on them.
- Let the chocolate harden completely. I usually pop the pan in the fridge, or outside on a cold day to help it along. When it’s all hardened, break it up into pieces and you’re good to go. You get little bits of crunchy cookies and bursts of cinnamon candy all with that creamy almond bark. It’s SO yummy and different and perfectly Valentine-y.
Storing and Other Tips
- Store finished popcorn in an airtight container at room temperature. Candy-coated popcorn stays delicious for several days! Consume within one week for best results.
- This popcorn makes great gifts! Fill small bags, jars, or bowls wrapped in plastic for family and friends. you can make these a day or two ahead of time.
Frequently Asked Questions
I only have butter flavored popcorn. Is that ok?
Any popcorn will be delicious! I prefer to use air popped, plain, or natural popcorn so the yellow butter color doesn’t come through, but if buttered is all you’ve got, go for it!
Can I add cinnamon powder?
Cinnamon oil and cinnamon powder have a bit of a different flavor. If you don’t have cinnamon oil, just let the red hots flavor the popcorn.
Cinnamon Cookie Crunch Popcorn
Sweet and salty popcorn mix with bursts of cinnamon candy and cookie crunch.
Servings servings
Equipment
Ingredients
- 12 cups popped popcorn natural, or lightly salted works best
- 1 pound almond bark
- ½ cup red hot candies
- 10 Oreo cookies about 1 ½ cups chopped, or 5oz
- ¼-½ teaspoon cinnamon flavored oil optional, see note
- 2-3 tablespoons semisweet or dark chocolate chips
- kosher or sea salt
Instructions
- Place popcorn in large mixing bowl.
- Place red hots in a heavy duty ziplock bag and smash with a meat mallet or hammer to crush. Roughly chop Oreo cookies into rough crumbs/chunks.
- In a medium sized microwave safe bowl, melt almond bark according to package instructions until smooth. Add cinnamon oil to taste, if using.
- Pour mixture over popcorn and stir well to coat. Pour popcorn mixture onto a baking sheet lined with foil, parchment or a silicone mat and set aside. Melt chocolate chips and drizzle over popcorn mixture.
- Sprinkle kosher or sea salt lightly over mixture to taste. Let popcorn mixture harden, place in fridge to speed it up. When completely dry, break into chunks and just try to stop yourself from eating it all in one sitting.
Notes
- Cinnamon oil (available online or at cooking stores and sometimes in the baking aisle) works well for this. You can use extract, but mix it in fast as it can cause almond bark to seize.
- Store finished popcorn in an airtight container at room temperature. Candy-coated popcorn stays delicious for several days! Consume within one week for best results.
- This popcorn makes great gifts! Fill small bags, jars, or bowls wrapped in plastic for family and friends. you can make these a day or two ahead of time.
Nutrition
Calories: 305kcal, Carbohydrates: 43g, Protein: 2g, Fat: 13g, Saturated Fat: 11g, Polyunsaturated Fat: 1g, Monounsaturated Fat: 1g, Trans Fat: 0.01g, Sodium: 51mg, Potassium: 60mg, Fiber: 2g, Sugar: 31g, Vitamin A: 22IU, Calcium: 3mg, Iron: 2mg
Calories: 305kcal
Cost: $5
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Questions & Reviews
Hi! I made the peppermint bark popcorn not to long ago and found that coating the popcorn in the almond bark made my popcorn loose its crunch and I would drescribe it soggy more than anything. It had good flaver but the texture made it gross after it cooled and everything. Did I miss a step or do something wrong? Thanks!
Okay, so where do you buy a big bag of red hots? I went to Wal-mart and the only ones I could find were with the food coloring in the little sprinkles bottles? I looked on the candy and seasonal aisle to.
I just bought them at my local Albertsons in the Valentine candy aisle. Normally stores carry them year round in the candy aisle as well.
Check the candy isle at Walmart. The have them in movie type candy box for $1. Am I making any sense?
Where’d you get those heart napkins? I’m trying to slowly accumulate things for Valentine’s day this year!
Target! (Last year, but they have cute ones now too…)
You can find chocolate covered cinnamon bears at Winco in their bulk foods. And they’re always fresh. I’m so excited to try this recipe.
any ideas how far in advance you can make these without the popcorn getting stale?
Oh I’d say 2 or 3 days.
White chocolate works like a dream in popcorn recipes. I have a candy cane popcorn and even though it’s more expensive, I buy real whit choc and just melt it on medium power, a minute at a time in the microwave. It tastes so much better than almond bark, in my opinion and the real reason I do it is because of the hydrogenated oil. I am no health nut but I have been trying to stay away from hydrogenated oil. I think one of the first few ingredients in almond bark is hydrogenated oil. It’s worth it for me to buy real whit chocolate….plus if you can get it at a place like orson gygi in a large brick, it may not be that much more than the almond bark. Also, I too am a fan of choc covered cinnamon bears….try dipping your own. I did when I was making Oreo truffles this year…to use up the leftover chocolate, I bought cinnamon santas and dipped the lower half of them in chocolate then set them on wax paper to dry…..so yummy. Thanks for an awesome post! I can’t wait to try it.
I love your blog and all your recipes. However, because of the disease that my boy’s have we don’t eat gluten or dairy. I can substitute and get away with a lot (including soy chocolate); however, almond bark and white chocolate are seriously the only thing that I can’t substitute. How sad is that—so for us that leaves out the popcorn. But oh, boy, someday when I don’t have to worry about my boys (which let’s face it, will never happen)–I’m all over this.
Any idea how many of those mini oreo’s in the bag would equal 10 regular?
I have bags of those and they crush super easily … In fact most of the time they come crushed 🙂
Cinnamon bears are so beautiful. I didn’t know there were other people like me out there. I knew I’d like this recipe before I even read it.
Wow, I think you could soon do a small cookbook with “Popcorn Only” recipes. I’ve used the cinnabon and peppermint chocolate recipes; both turned out great and were greatly appreciated by my neighbors at Christmas. Even more amazing, one of my neighbors did the same thing so I got some back to munch.