Make matzo into a deliciously different dessert with this Matzo Crack recipe. So chocolate-y good!
Welcome to the April 3, 2016 edition of Sunday Scratchups: Your weekly recipe from scratch around sales and affordable foods. Some of you may have large quantities of matzos in your house this week from seasonal sales, so here’s a great use for it: Make Matzo Crack!
For a brief shining moment, I thought I was so clever thinking of this idea based on the Christmas Crack recipe with saltine crackers that has been floating around for years. Turns out a number of people thought of it long before I did, though, so this Matzo Crack recipe is basically a mashup of these two recipes from Once Upon a Chef and Smitten Kitchen. And it. Is. Scary. Good.
More matzo fun
Not feeling dessert-y? If you’re looking for something more salty & savory (or have a big five lb box of matzo to use up), you could also try: Everything But the Bagel Matzo Crackers.
Matzo Crack
Ingredients
4-5 unsalted matzos
2 sticks (1 cup) salted butter
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
Sea salt
10-12 oz bag semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 cup chopped walnuts
extra sea salt, for sprinkling
Directions
Line a rimmed baking sheet with foil, making sure it goes up the edges, and top with parchment paper. Spray parchment or use your butter wrappers to lightly grease. Cover entire bottom of baking sheet with a single layer of matzos, breaking to fit when necessary.
Note: Although matzo is perforated and looks like it would break along nice even lines, it doesn’t necessarily break cleanly like you’d expect. This is the bread of affliction, people; it’s not here to make your lives easier … 😉 It doesn’t matter how it looks on the bottom of your pan, though, since your matzos are basically there to hold up all the sugar and chocolate to come.
At this point, start preheating your oven to 350 degrees and make your toffee layer:
Add butter, brown sugar, vanilla, and just a bit of sea salt to a medium saucepan. Cook over medium heat and whisk constantly until mixture comes to a boil, then continue cooking and whisking for another 3-4 minutes until toffee mixture is thickened, begins to get foamy, and pulls away from the sides of the pan as you stir.
Turn off your burner, pour toffee over the matzo layer, then spread evenly with a small rubber spatula. Caution: This is approximately the temperature of molten lava when you first pour it, yet will harden quickly and become very difficult to spread. Get this layer done immediately, carefully, and quickly.
Now bake your matzo-toffee concoction at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Your toffee layer should be bubbling all over when ready, and be careful not to overcook. Remove from oven and immediately pour chocolate chips over the top. (I used Enjoy Life mini chips because that’s what I had handy, but any semi-sweet chips should do.) Let these sit for a few minutes until softened and melting, then use your spatula to spread the chocolate layer evenly across the top.
Top with chopped walnuts and a little sea salt. Refrigerate for about 40 minutes, placing the hot cookie sheet on oven mitts or a towel to avoid the chance of cracking a glass refrigerator shelf. When chocolate is hardened, lift the whole Matzo Crack out of the pan using the foil edges and break into pieces.
Store leftovers (ha! ha!) refrigerated in an airtight container.
Note: If you are making Matzo Crack for Passover, leave out the vanilla extract (or use a substitute) and ensure that the brown sugar and chocolate you use are labeled Kosher for Passover. I also used unsalted matzo since that’s traditional and the sale item we have here this week — if yours happens to be salted; you might want to use unsalted butter.
Seriously, don’t make Matzo Crack if you’re trying to avoid sugar
This is the best thing ever to happen to matzo, I tell you. It’s so dangerous that I had to bring most of this batch over to a friend’s house just to remove the temptation from ours. You might also be unable to stop eating it… But, enjoy!
Matzo crack, printable recipe
Matzo Crack
Equipment
Ingredients
- 4-5 unsalted matzos
- 2 sticks (1 cup) salted butter
- 1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- Sea salt
- 10-12 oz bag semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 1 cup chopped walnuts
- extra sea salt, for sprinkling
Instructions
- Line a rimmed baking sheet with foil, making sure it goes up the edges, and top with parchment paper.
- Spray parchment or use your butter wrappers to lightly grease.
- Cover entire bottom of baking sheet with a single layer of matzos, breaking to fit when necessary. (Note: Although matzo is perforated and looks like it would break along nice even lines, it doesn't necessarily break cleanly like you'd expect. This is the bread of affliction, people; it's not here to make your lives easier...)
- At this point, start preheating your oven to 350 degrees and make your toffee layer:
- Add butter, brown sugar, vanilla, and just a bit of sea salt to a medium saucepan.
- Cook over medium heat and whisk constantly until mixture comes to a boil, then continue cooking and whisking for another 3-4 minutes until toffee mixture is thickened, begins to get foamy, and pulls away from the sides of the pan as you stir.
- Turn off your burner, pour toffee over the matzo layer, then spread evenly with a small rubber spatula. (Caution: This is approximately the temperature of molten lava when you first pour it, yet will harden quickly and become very difficult to spread. Get this layer done immediately, carefully, and quickly.)
- Now bake your matzo-toffee concoction at 350 degrees for 10 minutes.
- Your toffee layer should be bubbling all over when ready, and be careful not to overcook.
- Remove from oven and immediately pour chocolate chips over the top. (I used Enjoy Life mini chips because that's what I had handy, but any semi-sweet chips should do.)
- Let these sit for a few minutes until softened and melting, then use your spatula to spread the chocolate layer evenly across the top.
- Top with chopped walnuts and a little sea salt.
- Refrigerate for about 40 minutes, placing the hot cookie sheet on oven mitts or a towel to avoid the chance of cracking a glass refrigerator shelf.
- When chocolate is hardened, lift the whole Matzo Crack out of the pan using the foil edges and break into pieces.
- Store leftovers (ha! ha!) refrigerated in an airtight container.
Notes
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Dayna
Sunday 28th of March 2021
Soooooooo good!
Matzo Crack Is Peak Passover: But What Is It? – WCCO | CBS Minnesota
Thursday 3rd of September 2020
[…] Chocolate Dipped Matzo Crack Sampler […]
Dayna
Monday 22nd of April 2019
Absolutely delicious!! I have such a hard time finding Passover desserts and this just made it to the top of my list!!! Will be making this every year!!!
Tori
Saturday 22nd of December 2018
This seems extremely similar to this recipe which was published in 2009, even down to some of the jokes. Just wondering if you used it and why you didn't reference it?
https://smittenkitchen.com/2009/04/chocolate-caramel-crackers/
rachel
Saturday 22nd of December 2018
I actually do — look in the paragraph under the second photo. 🙂
Jen
Tuesday 12th of April 2016
OK, late to the party here but I LOVE matzo crack. I make it every Passover to rave reviews. You can play around with the chocolate you used too--sweeter is good, but I love it a little darker to play off the sweet sugar. I also love it with slivered or sliced almonds on top. And the salt really adds so much too.
And the real reason I wanted to comment: matzo balls! I have tried probably 8 or 9 different recipes in my quest to impress my jewish in-laws, ha. I think I've perfected them, as last year my father in law told me my soup was better than his own moms! I basically use the recipe from Smitten Kitchen (http://smittenkitchen.com/blog/2008/02/matzo-ball-soup/) for the matzo balls, which I'm pretty sure is just a variation on the recipe from the Manischewitz matzo meal can. I use the seltzer water option mostly just because I always have it in the house--I've never tested it with just stock. While they're good with veg oil, if you ever have the chance to make them with chicken fat (schmaltz) they really enter a whole new stratosphere of deliciousness. (And you can make the schmaltz for free if you just trim and then render fat from a whole or pieces of chicken. I usually save the trimmings in a freezer bag and just pull it out when I want to make matzo balls.) Another key is simmering them in stock that's flavorful and salty. I usually use half homemade and half boxed stock, with salt added. Finally, you have to cook them in very gently simmering liquid to the right degree of doneness. This takes some playing and practice to perfect the timing because if they're undercooked they'll be dense in the middle--cut one open and look to see if the center is a slightly different color than the rest. Cooking them al the way through makes them lighter and flavorful all the way to the middle.
My favorite thing is that once you've cooked them, you can freeze them! I've tried freezing before cooking but I found they tended to be super dense that way. (If that's the kind of matzo ball you like though, go for it!) Cook them through, then put them on a sheet tray until they're cool enough, then pop the tray in the freezer, and put them in plastic bags once they're solid. Then I make some homemade chicken stock and freeze it in meal-sized portions too. When I want soup, I just defrost one bag of stock, bring to a boil, and then drop in however many frozen matzo balls I need. It is so simple.
rachel
Wednesday 13th of April 2016
Thank you! I have actually never made from scratch matzo balls -- it's always what my MIL used to make for our Passover meals, so never had the occasion to. But I like the idea of having them handy year round. :)