Movie Night Munchies (Homemade Microwave Popcorn & Cinnamon Crispies)

The weekend is a perfect time to have movie night at home.  Who doesn't love watching movies at home?  About once every 2 months I hunker down with all 8 Harry Potter movies and make a small batch of my Cinnamon Crispies, and a small bowl of my homemade microwave popcorn.  If you need a salty, sweet or crunchy snack fix, then you are in luck.  By the way, do I have any fellow Potter fans out there?


With Thanksgiving arriving next week, a nice, quiet evening in with a stack of movies is in order.  I'm going to need all the relaxing I can fit in this weekend because once Monday rolls around, the eating and cooking and baking marathon begins.  I hope you'll make these snacks and grab your favorite blanket, put on your warmest, fluffiest pair of socks, get comfy on your couch and pop in a DVD.  Then, pop some of these snacks in your mouth!

Say hello to Cinnamon Crispies.  ("Ello Govnuh")  Yes, I *did* actually work in a British accent.  Sometimes I randomly break out in a British accent. Don't be alarmed.  I'm not a professional, but I play one on TV.

So, back to the Cinnamon Crispies.  These are addictive. I'm not kidding. This is the cinnamon and sugar equivalent to crack.  I've never had crack, but I can confidently presume these are just like crack, only better.  No pipes, or syringes or crack ho's needed.  Yes, I just said ho.  I blame my friend Mandy from South Your Mouth.  She calls her friends "Hookers"

You can read all about it on her blog. I've included a hyperlink because I think she's hilarious, irreverent, and her food is slap yo momma good!  (I may have a serious problem with tangents. I'm always going off on one.)

Speaking of tangents. Did you know that  mathematically a tangent is the trigonometric function that is equal to the ratio of the sides (other than the hypotenuse) opposite and adjacent to an angle in a right triangle?  No? Well- you do now.
See, my tangents may mean that it takes longer to get to the recipe, but I just dropped some solid, hard core knowledge on you guys, so obviously they're highly beneficial because you never know when you'll be on Jeopardy, or when you're getting your toosh kicked in Trivial Pursuit, when all of the sudden "tangents" comes up, and you're like all excited because you just wanted to make some doggone movie snacks and instead you ended up getting a calculus lesson but you're able to win your Trivial Pursuit game and you go onto Jeopardy and you win gobs of money ALL because I went off on a little ol' tangent.  HOLY Shizzle!  I just Googled "tangent".  I honestly had no idea that tangents were actually used in calculus because simple algebra equations reduced me to a catatonic puddle of uselessness on the floor, so for me to guess and be right--Daayamm-I.am.goood! 
(I just gave spell check and grammar check an aneurysm.)  (I also quite possibly just wrote one of the longest run-on sentence known to man in that paragraph.)


Cinnamon Crispies

Makes: Enough
Preheat oven to 375 degrees

What you'll need:
Cutting board
pizza cutter
pastry brush
microwave safe bowl for butter
cookie sheets

INGREDIENTS:

• 8-10 taco sized flour tortillas
• 6 TB unsalted butter (if you don't have unsalted, salted will do)
• Cinnamon
• Granulated Sugar

DIRECTIONS:

1. Melt butter in microwave safe bowl.
2. Lay two tortillas on your cutting board.  Using the pastry brush, spread butter over entire surface of the tortillas.
3. Sprinkle a light, even layer of sugar over the entire tortilla. Next, do the same thing with the cinnamon.  I didn't include measurements for the sugar and cinnamon because it is a personal preference as to how much or how little you will want to use. 
4. Using the pizza cutter, slice each tortilla into 4 even vertical strips, and make one horizontal cut across the center of the tortilla.
5. Places sliced tortillas on a cookie sheet and bake at 375 degrees for 10-15 minutes until GBD (golden brown & delicious) I like mine a little crispier so I let mine bake longer.   If they aren't GBD, put them back in until they are. You don't want under baked chewy tortillas.  That's just not right.

Homemade Microwave Popcorn

Serves 1-2 


What you'll need:

• 2 paper lunch bags
• 1/4 cup popcorn seeds
• 1 tsp. safflower, coconut, olive or canola oil
• Salt
• copious amounts of butter (you might have some left over from making the cinnamon crispies)
• A stapler- just trust me.
• A microwave.  I know, this should be a given, but you never know.  I can just see myself getting an email from someone who is all like  "Um, whoa- like I was going to make your homemade microwave popcorn, but Duude, I had no idea I was going to need a microwave!"

DIRECTIONS:

1. Melt a TB or two of butter.
2. Open one of the brown paper bags, insert the second bag unopened into the first bag and gently open that.  Essentially, you just double bagged your lunch bag. I could have just saved a ton of energy telling you to simply double bag your bag.
3. Toss in 1/4 cup popcorn seeds.
4. Add 1 tsp oil and a pinch of salt.  Shake to coat the seeds.
5. Fold the bag over once- no more than 1/2" size flap/fold.
6. Put ONE staple on each corner of the fold to secure.
7. Place bag on its side in the microwave.
8. Microwave for 2 minutes.  You may need to go a little longer, or a bit shorter.  When there are 3 or more seconds in between pops,  stop cooking so you don't burn your popcorn.
9. Remove bag carefully from microwave (bag will be oily)- wipe down your microwave.
10. Carefully open the bag, don't burn your fingers on the steam
11. Pour in your melted butter and sprinkle on some salt.  Shake the bag to coat the popcorn.
12. Pour into a bowl and enjoy!

Homemade Microwave Popcorn

But Kacey- you CAN'T put metal in the microwave.  Um, yes you can.  We used to put stainless steel bowls full of couverture chocolate into microwaves in culinary school.  The bowl has rounded sides and as long as it doesn't touch the sides of your microwave you can do that.  Sadly a fork or a ball of tinfoil will probably start a massive fire, so don't try that.  But two tiny staples will not cause any type of reaction in your microwave.  I've made this popcorn a hundred times, AND Alton Brown even makes his popcorn like this. And if Alton Brown says it's okay. Then it is okay.