Cake Mix Cookies

Confession: sometimes I'm a lazy dessert-maker. Perhaps you can understand my dilemma. I'm sure you've experienced it at some point: you need dessert right now and you don't have time to labor over a culinary delight before the need gives way to hangry tirades.

{Seriously - please tell me you've been there. This week.}

When I'm a good plan-ahead wife, I make a big dessert on Sunday, and we munch on it throughout the week. When I'm the worst plan-ahead wife, we buy a carton of ice cream, and we munch on it throughout the week. When I desire to appear that I've planned ahead more than I really have, we have cake mix cookies.

They're brilliant, really. If you have a cake mix on hand, and a some eggs and oil to spare, you can have hot, fresh cookies in about 15 minutes flat with the most minimal mess to clean up. A baking dream.

They're soft. They're chewy. And they're any flavor of the cake mix world you like. So essentially, regardless of your craving, you can probably satisfy it.

Ryan and I have recently fallen in love with multiple batches of lemon cookies. They feel a bit on the classy side...as though we should be going to a tea somewhere. But if you're not a lover of lemon, that's okay. Pick your favorite flavor and go!

Cake Mix Cookies

* 1 box cake mix - any brand, any flavor
* 1/3 cup vegetable oil
* 2 eggs
* chocolate chips/nuts/other add-ins/frosting optional

Combine cake mix, oil, eggs, and any add-ins of your choice in a bowl and stir until well-mixed. Drop by teaspoonful onto greased cookie sheets and bake for 10 minutes at 350. Makes roughly 2 dozen cookies, depending on the size of the cookies.

A Few Tips:

* You really can make these cookies as fancy or plain as you want based on what you add in. The chocolate cake mix variety tastes good with white or milk chocolate chips. You can add nuts, too, if you want.

* These work well with frosting, too, and if you're in a hurry, you can grab a tub of whatever flavor of frosting you like.

* I've tried making these using my baking stone, and find that they take longer to make because they don't bake as quickly and I have to leave them on the stone longer to keep them from falling apart when I remove them. Clearly I've moved back to a metal pan for this recipe because I'm in too much of a hurry to wait!

* Once upon a time, I tried making this with a homemade cake mix. It did not go well. It was dreadfully dry and crumbly. I haven't messed around with it enough to figure out what went wrong, but just in case you have homemade cake mix...beware that it might need some tweaking!

* These stay pretty soft on their own. When I make regular cookie recipes, I store them with a piece of bread in the container to keep them soft, but these don't require that.

* If you have extras and need help eating them, invite us over. We're equal to the task.