While Chex mix is available at grocery and convenience stores, it doesn’t hold a candle to the flavor and texture of homemade. This savory snack is perfect for a variety of occasions (including smuggling into a ballpark) and it’s so customizable (try giving it a Southwestern spin). However, it can come out a bit dry. If this has ever happened to you, you might be wondering where it went wrong.
Dry Chex mix is typically the result of too little butter. Maybe you skimped on it because you thought it would make everything soggy; actually, butter does the opposite of that, because it helps everything get nice and crispy when it’s baked. While you might not be able to salvage this batch of mix (it has already been baked, and more baking could make it burn), you can do right by your next batch.
Make sure you are using at least one stick of butter per 10 cups of dry ingredients. And instead of dumping all the melted butter in at once and mixing it, pour it into the dry ingredients in stages, mixing as you go, so that it gets evenly dispersed throughout.
What if your Chex mix comes out soggy?
Say your Chex mix has erred in the other direction — you baked it for the prescribed amount of time and somehow, instead of crisping up, everything is, well, wet. Moist. Soggy. It’s a big bummer (though not as much of a bummer as declaring the mini breadstick your favorite piece of store-bought Chex mix). Did you stick to the amount of liquid ingredients, or did you use more than the recipe called for? Using too much butter or Worcestershire sauce can definitely have a dampening effect on your Chex mix.
You might also have piled everything too high when baking or put too much on one tray. If too many pieces were touching each other, the heat can’t reach every nook and cranny. Chex mix has to be spread out on a baking sheet in order to crisp up. If you pull the mix out of the oven and it’s not crunchy, you could place some on a second baking sheet and put both trays in for another 15 minutes.
