I'll have s'mores.

July 6, 2014 7:57 PM

The Girl Scouts published the first recipe for Some Mores in 1927, and it just took off. The s'more has become an All-American campfire treat … and the combination of warm gooey marshmallow, melty chocolate, and crisp graham cracker has inspired a bunch of other s'more-inspired recipes. I give you: Triple dipped apples. Pie. Popcorn. Mini donuts. Stuffed cookies. Dip. Ice cream. Chocolatier ice cream. Homemade pop tarts. Macarons. Cups. Fudge. Krispies Bar. Truffles. Cheesecake. Pie pops. Bites. Milkshake. Empanadas. Trifles. Frozen.

And then, there are the variations on the classic s'more: With bourbon and bacon. With Thin Mints. With Fruit. Reverse s'mores. Apple Pie-esque, PB&J, and more

If you don't have a campfire, there's always indoor s'mores, made in a cast-iron skillet.

The Dirtbag Gourment has rounded up a basic history of s'mores.

posted by julen (25 comments total)

When I was in Cub Scouts 50 years ago, the Boy Scouts were actively trying (and succeeding) to steal the credit for S'mores. Typical.
posted by oneswellfoop at 8:03 PM on July 6, 2014

Halcyon in Austin has tableside s'mores.
posted by birdherder at 8:10 PM on July 6, 2014

It must be a s'mores type of day, because I had a s'mores bar at a bakery this afternoon and s'mores cookies at another bakery tonight.

When I was younger, Mom tried to change s'mores from a Hershey bar between graham crackers to chocolate-dipped graham crackers, which was blasphemy.
posted by xingcat at 8:13 PM on July 6, 2014

I once made some with roasted cubes of Brie and berry preserves on herbed crackers on a campout. I called them s'more d'oeuvres.
posted by sourwookie at 8:13 PM on July 6, 2014 [6 favorites]

When I was younger, Mom tried to change s'mores from a Hershey bar between graham crackers to chocolate-dipped graham crackers, which was blasphemy.

This sounds like a tip found in a magazine, to sell Keebler Fudge Grahams
posted by sourwookie at 8:17 PM on July 6, 2014 [2 favorites]

I'm not a s'more fan, but my family loves to put a slice of banana (cut into a wheel) in with the chocolate and marshmallow between the graham crackers. Gives an extra dimension to the whole thing, they say.
posted by msbrauer at 8:17 PM on July 6, 2014

I forget where I read about this, but I have field-tested s'mores made with ritz crackers and peanut butter cups and they trump the original recipe handily. The salty, buttery ritz is so much better than the blandly sweet graham cracker.
posted by sevenyearlurk at 8:41 PM on July 6, 2014 [2 favorites]

Of course the Girl Scouts were responsible for the popularity of a totally awesome dessert.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 8:45 PM on July 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

I got a "Creme Brulee" kit awhile back that came with a butane torch. I'll be damned if I've ever made any Creme Brulee but for indoor marshmallow roasting, it comes in quite handy and is quite popular with the young'ins. I do split each large marshmallow into two smaller cylinders and assign four of each smaller cylinder to each half-graham cracker achieving a 2-marshmallow to s'more ratio with more control of marshmallow-innard distribution, with the majority of the roasting taking place on the surface of the four mattress-coil-like marshmallow pieces. Perhaps I have thought too much about this, but it came together much more organically and then the kids think they're getting FOUR WHOLE MARSHMALLOWS OMG
posted by aydeejones at 11:16 PM on July 6, 2014 [2 favorites]

aydeejones: There's a square-cube problem, right there. We would have a much greater problem with very high-dimensionality smores. These would fail to fill an appreciable amount of the smore space properly.
posted by curuinor at 11:20 PM on July 6, 2014 [3 favorites]

Also in my life my exposure to s'more "flavor" has taken this path:

* Real S'more -- word

* S'more Flavored Pop-Tarts -- ack, no, pass the brown sugar ones

* Microwave S'more, marshmallow heated in isolation and applied to non-heated cracker -- alright, I can do that

* S'more flavored ice cream topping chunks -- nope

* Toaster Oven S'more -- sure thing

* Butane Torch S'more -- now we're cooking with gas

I can only conclude that any effort to create a s'more through s'more raw material procurement and some modicum of preparation will exceed any effort to create an overall capturable "s'more" experience; without this preparation the term "s'more" is unacceptable. This is obvious but I feel like Star Trek should tackle this opportunity, and aw-shacks nostaglic Tom Paris on Voyager would be the one to do it, and I suspect he has mentioned them before but I cannot find it. I can only find fan fiction.
posted by aydeejones at 11:27 PM on July 6, 2014

But cruinor, as dimension increases the proportion of volume near the boundary of an n-sphere get closer and closer to 1. In real terms, that means more delicious toasted part and less gob-clogging cold center. Sure, the Heat Equation probably starts to fail, but it'd be worth it.
posted by benito.strauss at 11:53 PM on July 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

I never liked s'mores; instead, we slice a banana lengthwise (still in its peel) and open it up enough to stuff it full of hershey bar goodness, then wrap in foil and commit to coals till warm and gooey. Eat with a spoon as aoon as not molten.
posted by mightshould at 3:24 AM on July 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

Ironically, I find them to be a horrible food to eat while you're actually camping if you don't like sticky hands, but maybe my s'more handling skills are just a bit off.
posted by sonascope at 3:39 AM on July 7, 2014

I understand this violates a variety of rules, but make s'mores with Maya Gold and you won't regret it. Just don't let the kids see.
posted by Ella Fynoe at 4:11 AM on July 7, 2014

That recipe book is pretty awesome. It just takes for granted that all the girls will be proficient at building a fire and will have their pocket knife handy. I am neither a girl, nor the parent of a girl, but I am married to one, and from what she said there was precious little left in her Girl Scout troop that resembles this book - the spirit of "anything you can do I can do better" with regard to camping and etc. seemed to be gone, in favor of quiet indoor activities and selling more cookies. She never got to go camping with her troop, and the boring stuff they did do was enough to make her quit. I'm hoping that is specific to the troop she was in, and not to the organization in general, because the thought of that spirit being gone makes me sad. The old-school Field Guide I had in Scouts was like this; a small book that contained instructions for everything you needed to survive if dropped in the middle of nowhere. This is not a set of skills that should be left to boys only. Someone please tell me that an organization as politically forward-thinking as the Girl Scouts is still actively encouraging girls to get outside and set some snares to catch dinner...
posted by caution live frogs at 5:13 AM on July 7, 2014

The language of the original girl scout recipe is interesting. 'Though it tastes like "some more" one is really enough.' It feels unusual to me to say something tastes like some more. I would have said 'Though it makes you want some more.' I've heard British friends say something 'tastes more-ish' which I gradually realized probably just means you want more of it, but that's not something a modern American would say, I don't think.
posted by marginaliana at 6:26 AM on July 7, 2014

marginaliana: 'tastes more-ish'

This is a terrible neologism and must be burned with fire whenever it rears its head. We can then toast some more marshmallows on the fire.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:00 AM on July 7, 2014

With Thin Mints

THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING
posted by nebulawindphone at 7:34 AM on July 7, 2014 [3 favorites]

The Hershey's S'mores Cupcake mix from your local grocery is actually surprisingly good.
posted by maryr at 8:34 AM on July 7, 2014

If it weren't fucking July I would go home today and attempt to make S'mores Cookies as I have been meaning to for sometime, but it's going to be nearly 90 the next couple days, so NOPE.
posted by maryr at 8:37 AM on July 7, 2014

The sandwich place downstairs at work has s'mores cookies, and lately at home we've been making them in the microwave, sometimes adding a melty blob of peanut butter. Not quite the real thing but damn fine regardless. The microwave does solve the "inedibly hard block of chocolate" problem. however.
posted by tchemgrrl at 8:49 AM on July 7, 2014

My husband bought me camp cooking sticks (I have no idea if that is the right term) for Christmas, even though I rarely go outdoors willingly, so I can make s'mores in the fireplace all winter. Is it winter yet?!
posted by Sweetie Darling at 9:00 AM on July 7, 2014

I went to a party a few weeks ago and they had a s'mores booth where you'd jam a marshmallow on a Pocky stick, run it under a chocolate fountain, and then roll it in graham cracker crumbs. It was pretty ingenious! S'more-kabob!
posted by estherbester at 5:39 PM on July 7, 2014

caution live frogs, my wife leads a troop of Brownies. Last month, their service unit just had a campout that had about 75 girls sleeping out in the woods, plus another dozen or so Daisies (Kindergarten-first grade age) that just came for the day. So it may have just been her troop that was lame.

And they also introduced me to the smaco. Take a flour tortilla, spread peanut butter on it and then fill with marshmallow and chocolate chips. Fold in half like a taco, wrap in foil, and heat in your campfire. Almost makes me want to go camping. Almost.
posted by neilbert at 9:14 AM on July 8, 2014