So says Sarah…

With the Super Bowl right around the corner, all I can think about are snacks, snacks, snacks. Honestly, I don’t really care about the football game – I’m not a big fan of either team (because they aren’t the Packers or Niners), so I’m in it to win it on the snack front. We usually gather around the TV to yell at the players for missing the ball and laugh at the really-not-so-funny commercials.

It’s kind of a tradition.

This year I pre-made a couple of goodies to make sure they would be a hit on game day. I am already planning on making a big overflowing bowl of peanut butter popcorn. Alongside that crispy, tasty goodness will be homemade pizza with ricotta and prosciutto, yogurt covered pretzels, and also, horribly addictive sweet and spicy pecans.

For the holidays, my aunt sent us one of the biggest bags of fresh-from-the-tree pecans I’d ever seen. While looking at tons of pecan recipes, I decided to ditch all those steps for something super simple.

Sweet and spicy nuts.

This is a really easy recipe and you can tweak it to your taste and use any kind of nut you like – or a big mix of all different kinds – and change up the spices as you like.

Ingredients

4 cups raw nuts (I used pecans)

1 egg white

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon chili seasoning

1/2 teaspoon flour

Dash of pepper

What you do

Place your nuts in a big bowl. In a smaller bowl, mix together the seasonings along with the sugar and flour. Go ahead and preheat your oven to 250 F so it will be nice and warm when you’re ready.

In another small bowl, froth up your egg white. It doesn’t need to be whipped, just a bit bubbly. Now pour the egg over the nuts and give things a good stir, making sure all those nuts are coated.

Sprinkle the sugar and spice mix over the nuts and toss or stir until they are all nicely coated. Evenly distribute the nuts on a lightly greased sheet pan and then pop in the oven for 40 minutes. You can check on the nuts after about 20 minutes and give them a stir.

Give the hot nuts a dash of sugar and salt and then let cool before munching.

Enjoy!