Cookie thoughts
Something funny that has taught me a lot about cooking and baking... every year I do a major holiday cookie bake. Seriously, probably over 1000 cookies. For teachers, coaches, tutors, anyone whose gullet I think I can shove cookies down.
I'm a reasonably good baker. I know I am. I've had plenty of people tell me to go professional on it, and one woman who does have a small home-based cookie business has asked me to work with her (NO! She prays over each batch of cookies. This would not end well. Her cookies are good, though, so the praying might help?)
One of the cookies I always do is embarrassing: Betty Crocker Lemon cake mix, some extra lemon extract, cream cheese, and butter. Roll in powder sugar. They're the easiest cookie to do (I farm them out to the kids when I can) and.... they're invariably the one I get asked the recipe of most often. They're sweet, and gooey, and quite ok, and very artificial and yet even people who claim to be picky about local food only, organic this etc, go to those damn cookies, and ask for the recipes (including, I might add, the spouse of the owner of one of the best French bakeries in Seattle.)
Anyhow, the whole experience, repeated over the years I've been doing this cookie thing, has definitely taught me that sometimes the best ingredients don't make the cookies everyone wants more of, that there is no accounting for taste, and that lemony-and-gooey appears to be universally loved. It was... a bit of an eye opener for my foodie self.
Gooey Butter Cake Cookies
Note: written for butter cake, use any kind of cake mix. I use Better Crocker lemon.
8 oz (one package) cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 egg
1/2 t vanilla extract
1 package butter flavour yellow cake mix
Confectioner's sugar.
Preheat oven to 350F/175C
Cream together cream cheese and butter. Add egg and extract. Slowly add in cake mix and mix until well blended.
Roll into 1in balls, rolls in confectioner's sugar.
Place 1in or so apart on ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake 10-13 minutes, cool on wire racks. Sprinkle with additional sugar if desired.
Variations:
Lemon cake with lemon extract
Chocolate cake with peppermint extract
Spice cake with extra ginger
Given to me, but I have NOT tried it: Butter cake with rum flavour.
I'm a reasonably good baker. I know I am. I've had plenty of people tell me to go professional on it, and one woman who does have a small home-based cookie business has asked me to work with her (NO! She prays over each batch of cookies. This would not end well. Her cookies are good, though, so the praying might help?)
One of the cookies I always do is embarrassing: Betty Crocker Lemon cake mix, some extra lemon extract, cream cheese, and butter. Roll in powder sugar. They're the easiest cookie to do (I farm them out to the kids when I can) and.... they're invariably the one I get asked the recipe of most often. They're sweet, and gooey, and quite ok, and very artificial and yet even people who claim to be picky about local food only, organic this etc, go to those damn cookies, and ask for the recipes (including, I might add, the spouse of the owner of one of the best French bakeries in Seattle.)
Anyhow, the whole experience, repeated over the years I've been doing this cookie thing, has definitely taught me that sometimes the best ingredients don't make the cookies everyone wants more of, that there is no accounting for taste, and that lemony-and-gooey appears to be universally loved. It was... a bit of an eye opener for my foodie self.
Gooey Butter Cake Cookies
Note: written for butter cake, use any kind of cake mix. I use Better Crocker lemon.
8 oz (one package) cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 egg
1/2 t vanilla extract
1 package butter flavour yellow cake mix
Confectioner's sugar.
Preheat oven to 350F/175C
Cream together cream cheese and butter. Add egg and extract. Slowly add in cake mix and mix until well blended.
Roll into 1in balls, rolls in confectioner's sugar.
Place 1in or so apart on ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake 10-13 minutes, cool on wire racks. Sprinkle with additional sugar if desired.
Variations:
Lemon cake with lemon extract
Chocolate cake with peppermint extract
Spice cake with extra ginger
Given to me, but I have NOT tried it: Butter cake with rum flavour.