Edible Rosaries
To celebrate the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, we like to make an edible rosary! This can be accomplished with just about anything: mini muffins or donuts or cereal pieces at breakfast time, nuts or goldfish crackers or dried fruit at snack time, cupcakes or candies for dessert. You just need fifty-three of one thing for the ave—or Hail Mary—beads, and six of another thing for the pater— or Our Father—beads, plus about six of something to make the cross.
We hand out a paper towel or piece of paper, a plastic bag, and the rosary fixin’s to each person, and build our rosaries before we begin. Grownups or big kids help little kids to build. Then we sit around the table and say the Rosary. We let the kids eat each "bead" as we go along or place the “bead” in their plastic bag to eat later if they prefer.
Everyone really looks forward to it each year!
Ingredients
- For a cereal rosary
- Cap’n Crunch’s Crunch Berries or Lucky Charms a gluten-free version is available
- A slightly heaping ⅓ cup of cereal should be enough for each person to get 53 cereal pieces and 12 berry or marshmallow pieces. A standard 10-12 ounce cereal box will make about 25 rosaries.
- For a snack rosary
- Goldfish crackers + raisins + pretzel sticks
- 53 pieces is about ½ cup of goldfish crackers. 6 raisins is about 1 teaspoon. 1 ½ pretzel sticks for the cross. A standard 6.6 ounce bag of goldfish crackers and a small 1 ounce box of raisins and 9 pretzel sticks will make about 6 rosaries.
- For a chocolate rosary
- Regular or mini chocolate chips + regular or mini m&ms
- 53 regular chocolate chips is about 3 flat Tablespoons. 12 regular m&ms is about 1 flat Tablespoon. A standard 12 ounce bag of chocolate chips + a 3.14 ounce “sharing size” or a 3.1 ounce movie box of m&ms will make about 8 rosaries.
Instructions
- Build your rosary on the piece of paper. Begin by making the cross, then above it add a pater, three aves, and a pater. Branch off from one side of that pater with ten aves (1), then a pater, then ten aves (2), then a pater, then ten aves (3), then a pater, then ten aves (4), then a pater, then ten aves (5), ending the fifth decade at the pater you started with. Pro Tip: a rosary doesn’t have to sit in a circle, wind around a bit as needed to fit the rosary on the paper.