Samoa Rice Krispie treats

It's fairly common for me to have all the ingredients on hand for a new recipe.  Chocolate chips, flour, butter, sugar, salt...those usually grace my fridge and cabinets day in and day out.  Other ingredients are less common, but still make a regular appearance: dried fruits, marshmallows, coconut, Rice Krispies.  But it's not all that common that I have homemade caramel sauce just chilling in my fridge.  So when I came across this recipe earlier today, I knew it was fate that I make them tonight!

I made a few modifications -- first, I toasted the coconut.  Samoas are ubiquitous with toasted coconut in my book.  Then, I also added some of the toasted coconut to the Rice Krispie treats, because I thought that would elevate the coconuttiness of the Samoa Rice Krispie Treat (and they were delicious and I may, or may not, have eaten at least 3 4 of them while I was prepping the rest of the stuff for the Samoa treats)!  I actually didn't have as many Rice Krispies as I thought I had, so I halved the recipe and used a 9x9 inch pan, so my Rice Krispie Treats are a little thinner than I had hoped, but they're still delicious!

Samoa Rice Krispie Treats
Based on (but adapted a lot by me) this recipe (makes a 9 x 13 inch pan)

Ingredients:

4 Tbsp unsalted butter
40 large marshmallows, about 1 bag
6 cups Rice Krispies
1 1/2 cup PLUS 2/3 cup toasted coconut flakes, cooled
3/4 cup caramel sauce, preferable homemade (I used the caramel from the salted caramel apple pie, which I know I still owe you the recipe for, and will link to this as soon as the pie is up!!)
3 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Directions:

Spray a 9 x 13 inch pan with cooking spray.

Toast the coconut.
Place coconut on a foil-lined baking sheet and toast at 350F for a few minutes.
Mix/stir often.
Watch coconut very closely as it burns quickly.
Allow coconut to cool.

Measure out the Rice Krispies and add in 2/3 cup toasted coconut flakes.
Toss to mix.

Melt butter in a large microwave safe bowl (be sure to use a bowl a lot bigger than you think you'll need....the marshmallows enlarge....a lot!).
Toss marshmallows in butter to coat.
Microwave marshmallows for about 45 seconds.
Stir the mixture.
Microwave for another 45 seconds or until marshmallows are completely melted and the mixture is well blended.

Add the Rice Krispie-Coconut mixture to the marshmallows and stir well.
Pour into the pan.
Press firmly into the pan (a piece of wax paper lightly sprayed with cooking spray works well).
Allow Rice Krispie Treats to cool.

Once cool, cut into 24 bars (I made mine a little smaller)

Melt chocolate chips in a microwave safe bowl, stirring frequently so that they don't burn.
When completely melted, dip the bottom 1/3 of each Rice Krispie Treat into the chocolate (I skipped this part because my treats were a little thin, but look down below for the * and I'll tell you what I ended up doing myself).
Let them dry, upside down, on a piece of wax paper.
Mix together the caramel sauce and coconut in a small bowl.
Place a small spoonful (I used my small scooper, and then flattened it out with a fork) of the coconut-caramel mixture on top of each Rice Krispie Treat.
Drizzle with melted chocolate.
Let the Rice Krispie Treats set.

Try not to eat all of them at once!

* Because my treats were a little thin, I did the following:
I mixed together the caramel and coconut as above, and placed a small spoonful (scoopful) of the mixture on top of each Rice Krispie Treat, and the flattened it with a fork.
Then, I put them on a cooling rack with a piece of wax paper beneath.
I spooned 1-1.5 tsp of the melted chocolate over the caramel-coconut mixture.
I debated -- but ended up not actually -- sprinkling some additional toasted coconut on them, which I might do the next time I make them

Allow them to harden.