Think of this homemade version of cookie cereal as dessert and not breakfast, because this is NOT good for you – unless you count the milk. But it sure is delicious and fun to eat!
I woke up the other day dreaming about Cookie Crisp – you know, that sugar cereal from childhood that your mom would never buy for you in a million years because it was literally made of cookies? I suppose, as dreams go, that one is not that weird. Especially vivid dreams seem to be a common experience during this moment of shelter-in-place. And earlier that night I had watched an episode of an old sitcom in which one of the characters (inadvertantly) dresses up like the Cookie Crisp wizard, complete with cookie wand.
There may have been another reason I had cookie cereal on my mind: apparently, it’s the latest social media food trend. I am not actually on TikTok myself. But I do live with two teenagers – one of whom made a TikTok video that went viral and then was the subject of an article in her school paper about students grappling with TikTok fame – so I do hear about the quarantine food crazes. First there was dalgona coffee; then sourdough bread. Next came pancake cereal and finally, cookie cereal.
Cookie cereal strikes me as about a million times better than pancake cereal. Isn’t the point of pancakes that they are soft and fluffy? Add milk to something soft and fluffy and what you are going to get is. . . mush. Cookie cereal, on the other hand, has a proven track record; there’s already a store-bought version of it.
If you are at all like me, you probably grew up with parents that did not allow you to have sugar cereal except on very rare, special occasions. (As a result, ready access to Lucky Charms was one of the highlights of my college dining hall.) And you yourself have grown up to be a parent that doesn’t allow your kids to have sugar cereal either. (Indeed, my kids only get sugar cereal at summer camp.)
And that’s correct. Sugar cereal is terrible for you: full of, well, sugar and chemicals and artifical ingredients. That’s no way to start the day. Have some eggs, a smoothie, cold pizza or really anything else.
But while sugar cereal has no place in my house, dessert definitely does. Especially homemade desserts. Even a casual reader of this blog will deduce that I have a massive sweet tooth and despite my age and slowing metabolism, I will never, ever give up dessert. (Or Diet Coke, for that matter, which is also full of chemicals and artifical ingredients. But I digress.)
So when I woke up from a dream about cookie cereal, I was pretty determined to come up with a homemade version. I was just going to call it dessert, not breakfast, and justify it to myself that way.
And, as desserts go, cookie cereal is definitely a worthwhile indulgence. It’s sweet and incredibly fun to eat, with layers of texture. My version is made with tiny sugar cookies studded with sprinkes, which is absolutely critical to the fun. First, your teeth bite into the satisfyingly crunchy exterior of the cookie, and then there’s an additional layer of crunch when they encounter a sprinkle. So fun!
(Other versions of cookie cereal use chocolate chip cookies – or even storebought cookie dough, which is really not the point. Unless you have tiny chocolate chips, however I don’t think it works. These sprinkle sugar cookies are definitely the way to go, especially if you can source good sprinkles. I am exceedingly fond of the crunchy jimmies from Fancy Sprinkles.)
Then there’s the milk, which becomes sweet and thick, like a milkshake, when the tiny cookie crumbs dissolve. There’s a reason cereal milk is a thing, people! And forget about any artifical aftertaste or weird chemical coating in your mouth like you can get with sugar cereals. Homemade sugar cookie cereal tastes like sugar, butter and vanilla – nothing else.
As you might imagine, making cookie cereal is a bit of a project, but, I promise you, it’s super fun and almost entirely foolproof. The cookies are made with a rolled-out sugar cookie dough and you use the bottom of a large piping tip, i.e., the round part, to stamp out the circles. (Aim for cookies about one inch in diameter.) The cookie dough is a modified version of a recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction – a very reliable site, in my experience – and the trick of using the piping tip to cut out the cookies comes from Molly Yeh, who seems to make a lot of homemade cereal.
It can take a while to stamp out all the little cookies, but it is not tricky to do and many hands make light the work. So, this is a great project to do with the other members of your household, including kids. And this recipe makes a lot of cookie cereal – enough for the whole family to enjoy!
So, why not hop on the latest quaranatine food trend and whip up a batch of my homemade sugar cookie cereal? You may never find yourself longing for a bowl of Cookie Crisp ever again.
Ingredients
- 2 1/4 cups plus 2 TB all-purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp fine sea salt
- 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
- 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks or 12 TB) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 TB vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup rainbow sprinkles (not nonpareils)
Instructions
- Whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt and cardamom in a small bowl and set aside.
- Cream the butter and sugar in a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment on medium speed for 2-3 minutes, or until light and fluffy.
- Add the egg and vanilla and beat on medium-high speed until incorporated, about 1 minute, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula as necessary.
- Add the flour mixture and beat on low speed until combined. Add the sprinkles and beat just until combined.
- Divide the dough into two halves and roll out each half on parchment paper until it is 1/4 inch thick. Cover the dough - you can stack the halves if necessary - and chill until firm, at least 1 hour and up to 1 day.
- Preheat the oven to 350 and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Place one half of the rolled-out cookie dough on a cutting board and using the bottom of piping tip or other 1-inch circle, cut out as many tiny cookies as possible. Gather up the scraps into a ball and roll them out again. Cut out as many additional cookies as possible.
- Place the cut-out cookies on one of the baking sheets; they can be quite close together. (You can get 60 or so on a sheet.)
- Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until the cookies are brown at the edges. If they do not seem firm and crisp after 12 minutes, lower the heat to 250 and bake until the cookies are firm, checking frequently to prevent burning.
- Place the cookie sheet on a wire rack and leave the cookies on the sheet for at least an additional 10 minutes to firm up.
- Repeat with the remaining half of the cookie dough. Store the cookies in an airtight container until needed. (You should have close to 200 cookies.)
- To serve, fill a small bowl with cookies and top with milk or non-dairy milk of your choice. Eat with a spoon and drink the milk!
SO neat!
It’s actually easier than it sounds. I hope you give this recipe a try!