Celebrate the tastes of Arkansas: Wicked Mix 

When I was growing up we would spend every Christmas or Thanksgiving with my grandparents who lived in the Hill Country of Texas, a solid 6 hours from our home in the Panhandle. When you grow up in Texas, especially outside of the major cities, you just get used to having to travel longer distances to get places and so 6 hours was pretty average for us. But when you’re a kid that is still a long time to be stuck in a car, especially when your Hanson CD has repeated itself for the third time and you’re only a third of the way there.

Luckily my mom would always pack the leftovers from our Christmas plates, and so we were able to pass the time devouring cookies, fudge, smoked pecans, and all manor of treats that insured a massive sugar high. One of my favorites, though, was the Chex mix she would make – extra butter, extra Worchestershire sauce, extra garlic. It was so good.

These days it’s not safe for me to make massive batches of cereal mixes because it will, without question, be eaten in a matter of hours. But that’s where Wicked Mix comes in. It has great crunch and flavor I love that it’s a local company – in fact, the offices are just a few doors down from where my husband works. I love that it’s spicy and sweet, super crunchy, and packed with a variety of ingredients. And I also love that the founder was simply making something he loved and then saw that it was so good he needed to share!

While the star of the show in this cake is certainly the Wicked Mix itself – I used the Spicy Original, although chocolate-laced would be great too – I tried to replicate a little bit of the spice blend to give the entire cake a little sweet-and-spicy flavor. The mix of sweet, soft cake and spicy, crunchy Wicked Mix is sure to be a hit!

A few cook’s notes:

• If you’re making this ahead of time wait to sprinkle the cake with the Wicked Mix until right before serving to keep the crunchy texture fully intact. It will stay crunchy even after a few hours, but no one likes soggy pretzels or cereal!
• I made my cake in 6-inch cake pans, even though the recipe called for 8-inch, because I wanted the layers to be taller. Feel free to do either.
• If you’re planning on serving this immediately, sprinkling the Wicked Mix on top of the middle layer of frosting is a great idea.

Heather Disarro is a food-centric lifestyle blogger who is passionate about embracing the beauty that surrounds us in our everyday lives. She is a Texan living the expat life in central Arkansas with her husband, two sons, and two massive dogs. Heather writes her blog, Heather’s Dish, from an office filled with dust, dog fur, toys and plenty of love, grace and music. She revels in the opportunity to bring the love of cooking to the world as a way to love others well! You can also find Heather on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram and Google+.