Easy Peanut Butter Cake Mix Cookies
Four simple ingredients is all you need to make these Easy Peanut Butter Cake Mix Cookies. With a soft texture and rich peanut butter flavor, it is a recipe that you will find yourself making over and over again.
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Tips & tricks to achieve the most delicious cookies of your life!
Why this Recipe Works
There are other 4 ingredient peanut butter cookie recipes out there but nothing quite like this one because it starts with a cake mix.
Using a yellow cake mix for the base of this delicious cookie keeps the ingredient list down and the flavor outrageous. Just like it does for this Brookies recipe.
Adding a good quality peanut butter, along with melted butter and eggs gives the body of the cookie exactly what it needs to bake up perfectly every single time.
It also gives the finished product a luxurious texture and taste that you expect from a high quality dessert. You can also find that in this Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake Mix Cookie.
All of this with a handful of ingredients and less than an hour of work equals a recipe that you are going to treasure.
What Goes Into This Recipe
- Yellow Cake Mix: Using a yellow cake mix for this cookie creates a rich and perfect base that pairs perfectly with peanut butter.
- Peanut Butter: Use a good quality smooth or crunchy variety in this recipe .
- Melted Butter: Used instead of vegetable oil for a super delicious cookie.
See recipe card for full information on ingredients and quantities.
How to make 4 Ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies
1. Add the yellow cake mix to a bowl and whisk it to remove any lumps. Then add the peanut butter, melted butter and eggs.
2. Next, mix with a hand held mixer until completely combined.
3. Using a medium cookie scoop {1.5 tablespoon}, scoop dough into a bowl of sugar. Roll the scoop of dough completely in sugar.
4. Then place onto a silicone mat {or parchment} lined baking sheet. Using the tines of a fork, press down into the top cookie. Then press the tines into each cookie going the other direction to make a criss cross pattern.
5. Then continue to make the criss cross pattern with the fork until all of the cookies on the baking sheet have been done.
6. Bake in a 350 degree preheated oven for 8-10 minutes. They may appear to be slightly underdone but remove them from the oven. Then let them cool on the cookie sheet for 10 minutes. This will allow them to continue to bake slightly {from the heat of the cookie sheet} and set up nicely. Move to a cooling rack to cool completely.
Expert Tips
- Let the melted butter cool slightly before adding it to the cookie dough. If you add it while it is hot it could scramble the eggs slightly and cause a weird texture in the dough.
- Use a cookie scoop so that all of the cookies are the same size. This step helps the cookies bake evenly and it will help them keep a nice round shape. It also helps with this Hostess Cupcake Cookie.
- Don’t forget the iconic fork criss cross on top of the cookies. This seems super basic but it helps the cookies bake evenly. It also keeps anyone with a peanut allergy from eating them.
- Don’t over bake the cookies. Normally we wait until the edges are starting to brown slightly but that is the same color as the cookie. So bake for no longer than 10 minutes and cool them on the baking sheet for 10 minutes before moving them to a cooling rack.
Recipe FAQs
You can use natural peanut butter but because it is most often unsalted, you would need to add salt to the cookie dough. You can also expect the cookies to spread more and be crispier because of the higher oil content.
There are a couple of reasons why they have fork marks. The first being that the dough can tend to be thicker than other cookie dough. So the fork marks help to flatten the dough and allow for a more even bake.
Fork marks are also iconic for peanut butter cookies which would allow someone with a peanut allergy to know what kind of cookie it is.
Normally you would be able to tell if cookies are done when the edges start turning light brown. That is a little different when you are talking about a cookie that is a light brown color.
It is also important to not over bake a cake mix cookie because they can get over done easily.
The key to baking Peanut Butter Cookies with a cake mix is to bake them at 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes. They may appear to be slightly underdone but remove them from the oven anyway. I use the same steps in this Reese’s Pieces Cookie Recipe.
There are so many cookies that can be made with it! This Cake Mix Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe is one of my all time favorites. This Raspberry Crumble Cookie and Thumbprint Cookie are both great too.
There are a couple reasons why they can be dry and crumbly. The biggest reason is that they are being over-baked by a minute or two.
It could also be that the dry ingredients were over measured. The great thing about using a cake mix is that you don’t have to worry about that, all of the dry ingredients are premeasured.
Do you love easy delicious cookies? Try these recipes…
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Super Easy 4 Ingredient Peanut Butter Cookie with a Cake Mix
Ingredients
- 1 box yellow cake mix
- 1 cup creamy peanut butter
- ½ cup butter {melted}
- 2 eggs
For rolling dough in:
- ¼ cup granulated sugar
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°.
- Combine the cake mix, peanut butter, cooled melted butter and eggs in a large bowl and mix with a hand held mixer {or by hand} until completely incorporated.
- Using a medium cookie scoop {1.5 tablespoon} to scoop cookie dough mounds into a bowl with sugar. Roll cookie dough balls completely in sugar and place onto a silicone mat {or parchment} lined cookie sheet. Using the tines of a fork make a crisscross pattern into the top of each cookie.
- Bake for 8-10 minutes, remove from the oven and let cool on a cookie sheet for 10 minutes before moving them to a cooling rack. Repeat until all of the dough is baked.
- Store in an airtight container for up to 4 days or freeze for 3 months.
Notes
- Let the melted butter cool slightly before adding it to the cookie dough. If you add it while it is hot it could scramble the eggs slightly and cause a weird texture in the cookie dough.
- Use a cookie scoop so that all of the cookies are the same size. This step helps the cookies bake evenly and it will help them keep a nice round shape.
- Don’t forget the iconic fork criss cross on top of the cookies. This seems super basic but it helps the cookies bake evenly. It also allows people with peanut allergies to know that they are peanut butter.
- Don’t over bake the cookies. Being able to tell when a peanut butter cookie is done can be a bit tricky. Normally we wait until the edges are starting to brown slightly but peanut butter cookies are light brown. So bake for no longer than 10 minutes.
