Nutella Gooey Butter Cookies

39

August 17, 2010 by Dana

I am a list maker.  I make lists for everything in my life: to do lists, places to go lists, things to buy lists, people to see lists, and lists of lists I have to make.  I make mental lists, physical lists, lists in notebooks, lists on post-its, and lists on backs of envelopes.  Seriously, without lists I would get nothing done.  I would probably be jobless. Even homeless.  Or worse, I would be wondering around the supermarket wondering what to make for dinner.  The horror.

As anyone who makes ridiculous amounts of lists knows, the best part about making lists is crossing things off of them.  The sense of accomplishment you get from marking something off of a list is remarkable.  It’s sick, really, the joy that I get from that one little line.

Since I am clearly obsessed with food write a food blog, it should come as no surprise that many of my lists are food related: grocery lists, ingredient lists, weekly meal plan lists, party menu lists, and, of course, the ridiculously long list of recipes to try.  This list is massive, people.  I’m talking hundreds of recipes that I want to try, with constant additions and new items.  Imagine how amazing it feels to cross something off of this monster list!

Here’s the problem:  Every time I make something great, I get requests to make it again.  So when we were going to a friend’s dinner party this weekend, Jake requested that I make those delicious Smores Cookies I had made a while back.  Again.  Again!? I am never going to finish that list to begin with!  How will I even come close if I make Smores Cookies every time I need to make a dessert? How will I cross anything off??

I suggested making cupcakes, or a fruity dessert, or cake, or another kind of cookie.  But he wanted Smores Cookies.  So I went to the store and came back with the ingredients… for Nutella Cookies.

I knew I had to bring out the big guns for this.  I needed to make a cookie that would make him forget about the Smores Cookies, and these Nutella Gooey Butter Cookies fit that bill perfectly.

Ingredients

1 box chocolate cake mix
8 oz cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup Nutella (add more if you like)
sugar, for rolling

When I saw this recipe on Plain Chicken, I knew it would be amazing.  Nutella, cream cheese, chocolate, and butter… what more could a girl ask for from a cookie?

Directions

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2.  In a large bowl, cream the cream cheese and butter until smooth with an electric mixer. Add the egg. Then beat in the Nutella and vanilla extract. Mix in the cake mix. Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours to firm up so that you can roll the batter into balls.

3.  Roll the chilled batter into tablespoon sized balls, and then roll each ball in sugar.

4.  Place on a parchment lined cookie sheet. Bake 12-14 minutes. The cookies will remain soft.

Yields 36 cookies.

These cookies came out so amazing!  They are super chocolatey, with just a hint of Nutella flavor.  The texture is very soft and gooey (so soft, that they may break apart a little).  They kept very well in the refrigerator…. not that they were around for long.

Oh, and by the way, even Jake, who only wanted Smores Cookies, said they were very good and that I should make them again.  Another one crossed off the list :)