Easy Four Layer Marshmallow Bars

I've been busy the past couple of days, as I've been in frantic, clean-the-house-from-top-to-bottom mode to prepare for my parents' arrival on Wednesday night. As I have a business trip to Syracuse tomorrow through Wednesday afternoon, I had to get the cleaning done this weekend and tonight. On top of this all, I wanted to bake something to bring with me as I have coworkers that have gone above and beyond to help me prepare for this trip.

As I didn't have much time, I went back to a tried and true recipe that Heather had given me when we worked at Monster together - Easy Four Layer Marshmallow Bars. For some reason, I hadn't made this recipe in almost two years and I had almost forgotten how easy they were to make!

Here's what you need:

• 1 package cake mix (yellow or chocolate) - I've always used yellow.
• 1/4 cup melted butter or margarine - I used butter.
• 1/4 cup of water
• 3 cups of mini marshmallows
• 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup pecans, chopped
• 1/2 cup flaked, sweetened coconut

1. Preheat oven to 375.
2. Mix cake mix, butter and water until blended.
3. Pat into greased 9" x 13' pan (I used Pam baking spray with flour).
4. Bake 20 - 22 minutes (only 15 minutes in my old oven).
5. Layer marshmallows, chocolate chips, coconut and pecans over crust. Bake 2 -3 minutes or until marshmallows begin to melt.
6. Cool and cut into bars.

The only problem was that I was out of coconut and pecans - as a coincidence, I used the last of my industrial size bag of pecans from BJ's and the last bag of coconut on German Chocolate frosting that I made yesterday for the Mother's Day cake we brought over to Plymouth. So I improvised.

Here's the cake layer after cooking in the oven - you want to remove it when it's golden and just starting to get brown around the edges:



I topped one half with white chocolate chips and macadamia nuts and the other half with marshmallows, milk chocolate chips and almonds for a "rocky road" type topping - this is how busy the pan looked after I layered the different ingredients:



After going back into the oven for another five minutes, I pulled the pan out once the chocolate chips looked melted and the marshmallows were puffed and toasty on top. This is what it looked like from the Rocky Road side:



And the white chocolate chip/macadamia nut side - I hope it tastes better than it looks, it's looking a bit too monochromatic for me:



Bonus for me is that my Syracuse coworkers are going to think I made two different recipes! I'll keep you posted on how they ended up tasting, I'll put Andrew to work as the official taste-tester tomorrow.