Everyone has a favourite family recipe, some recipes are known and made by a few family members, others are made and enjoyed by everyone. Today’s recipe is one that everyone in my family enjoys. Sometime in the 1950’s to 60’s my Great Grandmother Rankin would have come across this recipe on a cereal box and started making it for her family. Today, every generation of our family makes this recipe, my Great Aunt Gail just made it last week, my mother, Uncle Terence, and Auntie Cheryl make it. So do my cousins, everyone makes it! It’s another really simple recipe so it’s no wonder we all make them.

Mom and I aren’t the first people in the family to share the recipe, it was included in a cookbook of a local company compiled by their employees. My Uncle had a successful career working for them and I happen to work there today. So this recipe is not only a part of my family but my work family as well. Or at least I hope to introduce them to it once more.

To add peanuts or not to add peanuts that is the question! We are not entirely sure who started adding the peanuts to this recipe. My Great Aunt Gail does not remember her mother adding peanuts, but my Uncle Terence recalls that she sometimes did. It just goes to show how family recipes can evolve and are made differently by family members. Either way, we decided to add the peanuts in today’s recipe. You can choose for yourself whether or not you want to include them.

Originally the recipe called for 3 10₵ Mackintosh’s Toffee bars (not sure how much they cost today but it’s not 10₵). My Great Aunt Gail liked to use 4 but recently changed it to 5 as the size of the bars have changed over the years. Mom and I often struggle to find the bars, they are not as readily available as they used to be. We now use a bag of individually wrapped toffee. The bags are much easier to find, just look in the candy isle of your grocery store.

Ingredients

1 246g bag of Mackintosh’s toffee
3 tbsp cream
½ tsp vanilla extract
3 cups cornflakes
½ cup shredded coconut sweetened or unsweetened
½ roasted peanuts (optional)

In a large bowl combine cornflakes, coconut and peanuts, set aside. Bring water in the double boiler to a simmer, and maintain the simmer during the melting process. Melt the toffee with the cream stirring constantly. Once melted remove from heat before stirring in the vanilla extract.

Pour the melted toffee over the dry ingredients stirring carefully so you do not break the cornflakes. Drop approximately 2 tablespoons of mixture onto a silpat, parchment paper, or wax paper. We often rearrange them a bit to make sure they aren’t too spread out.

We hope we have inspired you to make these chewy treats for your family and friends. I know they will love them as much as we do.