Turn Cake Mix Into Cookie Dough With Just 2 Added Ingredients

Everybody loves cookie dough. In fact, people love it so much that there are entire raw cookie dough shops dedicated to getting people their fix. Luckily, when a craving hits, it's pretty easy to throw together a cookie dough recipe in your own kitchen — provided you have the ingredients. If you lack the usual supplies, however, there is no need to panic. You can make fresh cookie dough in a pinch; all it takes is a box of cake mix and two additional ingredients: eggs and oil.

Cake mix isn't just a handy way to whip up a cake in a matter of minutes. In it are the ingredients that act as the foundation for a wide variety of baked goods: flour, sugar, salt, a leavening agent (usually baking powder), and a fat like vegetable shortening or butter that has been treated to be shelf-stable. If you've done your fair share of baking, you know that these ingredients are almost everything you need to make cookies. However, while only eggs and oil are needed to turn your cake mix into cookie dough, there are some other modifications at play.

Changing up the recipe on the back of the cake mix box for delicious, chewy cookies requires a couple of changes in the number and proportion of added ingredients. Directions on a typical boxed cake mix instruct a baker to add water, oil, and eggs. Cookie dough is meant to be thicker and more dense than a cake mix, so for this swap, you will be eliminating the addition of water. You will want to still include oil and eggs, but in a slightly different amount than listed on the box: Add just two eggs and a half cup of oil. Stir these ingredients together until combined, then bake as you would any other cookie dough.

The added bonus of this approach for making cookie dough is that it allows you to easily customize the flavors of your cookie by selecting a flavored cake mix. Use red velvet cake mix to bring an extra deep cocoa flavor to a chocolate cookie, keep it classic with vanilla cake mix and chocolate chips, or use lemon cake mix as a base with the addition of fresh raspberries for a fresh and fruity summer dessert.