12 Days of Christmas: Fancy Reindeer Chow
Day 6 with Tanya Bush
Hello and welcome Day 6 of the Kitchen Projects 2025 ‘12 days of Christmas’, our festive recipe advent calendar, exclusively for KP+, delivered straight to your inbox.
When I received Cake Zine co-founder, baker and author (book out in 2026!) Tanya Bush’s suggestion of developing a festive version of puppy chow called ‘reindeer chow’ for this series, my heart skipped a beat. HOW could anything be more perfect? I’ve loved returning to my chow-filled tubs for the last few weeks when I’ve needed a pick me up. These are truly a tonic for any slump, any slump at all.
by Tanya Bush
My first Christmas with my partner’s family was an education. I grew up a godless Jew in New Jersey with little proximity to Christmas spectacle, and so I was disoriented by all the rituals I’d never encountered: the cookie decorating, the ornament making, the mandatory viewings of It’s a Wonderful Life. There was a schedule. There were matching pajama sets.
The first year, I would pace around their kitchen, pretending to offer assistance while really just stuffing fistfulls of something they dubbed “Reindeer Chow” into my mouth, feeling like I’d somehow landed in a sitcom. Reindeer Chow, it turns out, is a kind of psychedelic trailmix, an assemblage of pretzels, cereal, and Red and Green M&Ms coated in a thick blanket of white chocolate.
It’s also known as Muddy Buddies, or Puppy Chow, just gussied up for Christmas. I’d pick out my favorite parts (the peanuts and pretzels) wondering how I had lived so long without the snack.
