Milk-Soaked Cookies Are A Sweet Hack To An Easy, No-Frills Cake

Do you ever wish you could snap your fingers and have a delicious cake suddenly materialize in front of you? Unfortunately, without magical powers, preparing a homemade cake usually requires a considerable amount of time and effort in the kitchen. While you can certainly make boxed cake mix taste homemade with unique ingredients like mashed bananas, buttermilk, or browned butter, not everyone keeps extra boxes of cake mix in their pantry. Luckily, however, if you have more common ingredients like cookies and milk, you can make a tasty cake in just a few simple steps.

Whether you made one too many chewy coconut chocolate chip cookies over the weekend or happen to have an extra box of graham crackers, you can repurpose these confections into a simple no-fuss cake that requires only three ingredients: cookies, milk, and baking powder. For the best results, aim to use dry or crunchy cookies that don't include any frosting or cream.

Start by mashing your cookies into fine, even crumbs with a food processor or resealable plastic bag and rolling pin. Then, in a separate mixing bowl, combine the cookie crumbs and a small amount of baking powder with warm milk. With gentle stirring, your cookie crumbs will absorb the milk and transform into a smooth and pourable batter. From here, simply pour the batter into a pan and bake your cookie cake.

Depending on the type of cookies you use, you can easily enhance the flavor and look of this simple cake with a few extra ingredients. If you plan on making this tasty dessert with crushed chocolate chip cookies, feel free to sprinkle the top of your batter with extra chocolate chips and crushed nuts before baking. For cakes made with more neutral cookie varieties like vanilla wafers or graham crackers, consider covering your cake with an extra special topping.

For example, a vanilla-based cake might benefit from a decadent layer of lemon curd or a tangy icing composed of lemon juice and powdered sugar. You can also cover your cake in homemade caramel or chocolate sauce. To keep things simple, use one of many clever ways to improve store-bought frosting, and just upgrade your next can with berry jam, flavor extracts, or ground spices like cinnamon or espresso powder.

While this simple cake recipe doesn't require many ingredients, if all you have in your pantry are Oreos or Lofthouse sugar cookies, make an alternative dessert instead. Believe it or not, you can use these iconic store-bought cookies to make delicious cake pops. All you need to do is combine blended Oreos or frosted sugar cookies with a small amount of cream cheese. Then, simply form the mixture into balls and dip in your icing of choice. Sure enough, cake pops are a decadent and moist snack-sized alternative to whole cakes made with crushed cookies.