If you’re on the same side of the internet that I am, you know cookie cakes are all the rave right now. I have dabbled it in myself and they aren’t hard to make by any means, you’re basically making a giant cookie and in the case of a cookie cake, adding frosting on top. This mix from Duncan Hines’ is referred to as a “mega cookie” likely due to the lack of frosting but it is all the same. I had my eye on this mix for awhile on Amazon but it was overpriced, as some groceries are occasionally, so I waited until it dropped in price. When it was about $3 I finally bought it.
This Mega Cookie box mix comes with cookie mix and a disposable 6 inch baking pan. All you need to make the dough is water and melted butter. Once mixed up, the dough tasted like any other box mix cookie dough and wasn’t great but wasn’t terrible. It was simply a dough that is better off baked than eaten raw. Using the spatula I flattened the dough into the baking pan and it was pretty thick. Unlike most mixes, this Duncan Hines mix gives two baking options, one that is the traditional oven route, and one that utilizes the microwave. I really like the inclusivity of this and it isn’t something you see very often. The box says that the oven route is superior so I did use my oven to bake this.
At 350 degrees, I placed the provided baking pan into the oven. The recipe calls for 20-22 minutes of baking, or until the cookie is lightly browned. You know by now I never trust box mix bake times so I kept checking on this mega cookie in the oven and at 25 minutes I decided the edges had browned and that had to be what they meant. I pulled it out of the oven and let it cool before cutting into it. I think this is the first time that we have seen a bake time that is under what is necessary, it’s a surprising change but not a good one. Any incorrect bake time is a bad thing.
I sliced the cookie up and was able to get about 6 servings that were a realistic size however the serving size of this mega cookie is 1/9 and I feel like that is a sick joke. First of all, those would be tiny, sad, slivers of cookie. Second of all, who cuts anything into 9 slices? Regardless, I took my cookie slice and gave it a try. Unfortunately, I found my mega cookie was under baked. Parts in the middle were still raw and it was in the way that the texture is wrong so you can’t just look passed it. Despite baking longer than the recipe called for, I had an under baked dessert and that is extremely disappointing.
While the baking issue is definitely a user error, despite following the directions, let’s address the taste. It was fine. Tasted like an alright chocolate chip cookie. It didn’t even matter because the cookie texture was sandy. The under baked soft middle and the sandy texture of the baked parts killed this box mix. This mix was a fail in all ways. It is sad to find something I have been wanting to try for so long was so disappointing. You’d be better off going homemade with this, the nestle chocolate chip cookie recipe works well to be made into a cookie cake or if you want something even simpler, buy premade cookie dough and press it into a pan, not too thick, and make your own “mega cookie”.
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