Chocolate Chip Cake Batter Cookies

It's almost Valentine's Day (aka my excuse to bake as much as I want without feeling guilty day), and to get into the holiday spirit, I decided to try out a Pinterest recipe I have had my eye on for awhile. Right now one of the popular posting trends is anything cake batter-related, so I decided to give these "Cake Batter Cookies" from "Lovintheoven" a try. I also decided it would be the perfect opportunity to test my creative skills and do some holiday-themed decorating. I also wanted to try this idea I discovered on Pinterest where you use a rubber stamp and stamp a design or word into the cookie. How cool does that sound!? But...

....then I remembered I am atrocious at any decorating related to baking.

And I realized this after the fact.

Love

Love? It's like a Magic Eye book, I swear it's there! 

Le sigh.

So, bear with me and my "unique" baking skills. I am going with the "love isn't perfect, it's the effort that counts" motto with these cookies. In all honesty besides their visual imperfections, these cookies are divine. The chocolate and cake batter combines perfectly and best of all, the cake batter isn't overpowering. They taste like cake batter without feeling like you are going to have a tummy ache (think anything from Coldstone). 

I'm going to blame the decorating on the dog. She has horrible
fine-motor skills!

Here's the recipe with a few important revisions to follow:

Ingredients:

• 3/4 cup flour
• 1 1/4 cup funfetti cake mix
• 1/4 tsp. baking soda
• 3/4 cup softened butter
• 1 egg
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 tsp. vanilla
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Cream together the butter and sugars. Mix in the egg yolk, egg, and vanilla until creamy. 
2. Add in the flour, cake mix, and baking soda.
3. Stir in the chocolate chips.
4. Refrigerate for at least an hour.
5. Preheat oven to 350.
6. Scoop heaping tablespoons of dough onto cookie sheets. (*Note: Up for debate, see "cons" below) 
7. Bake for 12-15 minutes, until the edges are golden.

Pros: They are super easy to make and taste divine. I am also partial to funfetti, so these really are my ideal kind of cookies. They are cookies with a twist. If you are in a baking mood and don't want to go wild, these are an easy treat to whip up and require most ingredients one already has in his or her home. 

Cons: We already know the whole "rubber stamp" idea was a bust. I think next time I would try it with a sugar cookie and a recipe that gives implicit instructions for how to go about this "stamping cookies" idea. Also, and this was my big issue, emphasis on the word big, my cookies were so big that they ended up baking into one big cookie sheet shape! The recipe does call for "a heaping amount of cookie dough", but she neglects to mention how big her cookie sheets are. I have those rinky dink sheets, so next time I would scoop out maybe half a tablespoon and bake them for half the time. It didn't effect the taste, but it did leave me with sort of abstract shaped cookies (to put it nicely).

Too heaping big!

Also, I have no idea why you had to refrigerate the dough. I don't think it made a difference. If you're in a rush, go ahead and bake them right away. I give you permission to do so. 

Revisions: On her website, she talks about how one thing she would try next time is to add more baking soda and a pinch of baking powder to help them rise more...it didn't work. I tried it, they were still flat. Flat and delicious. Don't bother with that. Also, I baked them all with chocolate chips; she only did one batch with chocolate chips. Why? I have no clue. 

Besides smaller scoops for baking purposes, there is nothing I would change about this recipe. It produces some tasty cookies! Although I might forego my decorating visions in the future....