I’ve never understood the attraction to pre-packaged box mixes, particularly
when the end result is an easy-to-make cookie or brownie. Isn’t making from
scratch nearly as simple? Besides, while there are no guarantees in life, it’s
fairly safe to say that homemade will trump just about anything that originates
from a cardboard box.
Or so I thought. A few weeks ago a catalog from the King Arthur Flour folks
fell out of my mailbox. Don’t ask why I found myself curious about a new cookie
mix the company was featuring, but I did. Maybe it’s because I once tried to
bake a similar Oreo-like chocolate sandwich cookie recipe (from Los Angeles uber-baker
and cookbook author Nancy Silverton), and it didn’t work out the way I’d hoped;
the recipe was fussy and time-consuming, and the finished product, at least in
my rank amateur’s hands, wasn’t stellar.
But a box mix? Maybe. I logged on, spent about five minutes on the company’s
website and just two days later it was sitting in my kitchen. That was easy.
Turns out, so was making them: I hauled out my trusty mixer and added butter and
an egg. Rolling and cutting the dough was a breeze, and the cookies came out of
the oven bearing a gently crisp exterior and a nicely chewy interior, with a
rich, slightly bittersweet chocolate bite. The icing came together in a snap,
and while my finished Rick-eos were far clunkier looking than the ones pictured
on the King Arthur box, they tasted as if I’d made them myself, which is how I
passed them off (just to be on the safe side, I buried the box at the bottom of
the recycling bin). For cheaters, these “homemade” cookies are pretty swell.
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