Sandra Lee’s Fifth Ring of Hell: Brainiac Breaks

CHAPTER 5: WRATH AND SULLENNESS

Guess who’s back? Back again? SUCH is back. Tell a friend!

Yes, it’s been a LONG while since I last touched this cookbook (I started writing this series when I was engaged to my first husband and now I’m married to my second!), but it’s time to finish what I began.

Let’s go!

I’m picking back up right where I started with the fifth chapter of Sandy’s incredibly condescending and infantile cookbook for children. Now that I have two kids of my own, I can wholeheartedly say that they would not eat ANY of this crap.

So, this chapter is called Brainiac Breaks, and it begins with Sandra Lee explicitly stating she’s not the brainiac here:

It’s true—when I was in school, I needed a little incentive to his the books. Not so with my nephew, Brandon, who makes great grades and aces baseball and football too. At 13, Brandon has learned that whipping up winning snacks is a smart way to score points, whether it’s after sports, after school, or after whatever. Big test tomorrow? Groovy smoothies make a mindblowing study buddy … or you could just wing it with Wild Teriyaki Wings. Chalk up an A for artistic with Nacho Potatoes or bake ‘n’ take Soft Pretzels for a postpractice pick-me-up. Snack attack? No way! Crack open the cookbook and batter up, then eat up the attention.

Wow…that intro is chock-full of awkward sports references and awkward slang. I’m also not sure what Sandy is adding to her smoothies that makes them “mindblowing,” but I doubt it’s legal.

So, aside from those snacks listed above, the chapter has “Turkey Wheels,” “Ham and Cheese Pockets,” “Power Burritos” (insert obvious fart joke here), “Pizza Braids,” “Chili Tots,” “Nuts and Stuff” (this is literally GORP with a stupid name), “Veggie Sticks & Cheddar Ranch Dip,” “BLT Dip,” “Oatmeal Energy Bars,” “Talkin’ Trail Mix” (another nonsensical name for what is basically trail mix), “Smoothie Pops,” “P.B. Smoothie,” and finally “Strawberry Energizer.”

I’m going to do a deeper dive into three of these monstrosities: Ham and Cheese Pockets, Chili Tots, and Oatmeal Energy Bars.

So, the Ham and Cheese Pockets recipe is essentially Sandra Lee’s take on Hot Pockets. Yes, she has taken a very cheap and basic product and made it absolutely disgusting (of course).

The ingredients include Pillsbury Grands! cheddar biscuits, condensed cheddar cheese soup (Campbells), Kraft shredded cheese, and Hormel diced ham. As usual, Sandy made sure to list her favorite brands so she can get some nice advertising kickbacks. I showed this to Jeff, my husband, and he was shocked that every page includes at least one brand name per ingredient. Hey, that’s just how Sandy rolls!

So, the recipe itself is nothing special, but the inclusion of cheese soup in a dough pocket makes me want to vomit. Can you imagine how much sodium is in these things? Ugh.

Next up, Chili Tots. As I wrote way back in 2007, this is essentially stoner food, like something a college kid would assemble after taking an edible. The biggest issue I have with this, as I do with many of her recipes, is that Sandra doesn’t take into account how SOGGY most of these foods will be. For this recipe, she takes a layer of frozen tater tots and dumps on turkey chili, hot dog slices, and cheese. A logical choice (and used in one of my favorite real Semi-Homemade recipes for tater tot casserole), is to put the tots on TOP of the wet stuff so they can brown and become crispy. Putting them at the bottom guarantees they will be mushy.

I don’t know how she always screws up simple recipes, but it’s her gift, I guess.

Finally, we have flavors I don’t want mixing any time soon in the Oatmeal Energy Bars. What appear to be basic oat bars get all messed up by adding peanut butter (Skippy is recommended, if you’re wondering) with Mott’s cinnamon applesauce. Now, I have loathed the non-homemade version for many years, so this is probably just a me thing, but mixing my beloved PB with applesauce is something I cannot tolerate.

Oh, and then she adds even more sugar to the “Energy Bars” with honey, Nestle chocolate chips (of course Sandy must rep for that evil company), and—what a surprise—Sun-Maid raisins! These sound absolutely terrible to me, plus she adds Bisquick to them for some reason. Just no.

In case you missed it, Sandy is ALL about kewl raisins!

So that’s chapter 5 of Cool Kids’ Cooking. I will give Sandra Lee one compliment though, as I’m trying to be a more positive person in 2026: It is absolutely lame and completely unnecessary, but the cat face in the BLT Dip is very cute.

There. I said one nice thing about her.

Next up, the appropriately titled Movie Munchies (Sandy was so hitting the ganja whilst coming up with these recipes.

If you’ve missed out on reading the first four installments, you can find them here. Enjoy the madness!