Double Chocolate Caramel Filled Cake Batter Cookies

Now that name is a mouthful on its own! So much chocolatey goodness packed into one cookie and just when you think it can't get any better, a surprise chewy caramel centre!

The inspiration came from Sally's cake batter chocolate chip cookies! The idea of using cake batter in a cookie is absolutely brilliant!!! Let's face it, who doesn't love cake batter?!?! Even better, I am an absolute chocolate lover so why not use chocolate cake mix! So I started brainstorming...

I originally decided on triple chocolate cake batter cookies (which I will eventually do a recipe for) - they were basically the same as the ones I ended up making but instead of having a caramel centre, they would have had a gooey chocolate centre! I didn't have any chocolate wafters on hand but I did have caramels left over from the homemade turtles I didn't get to this past Christmas! So that was the deciding factor on what kind of cookies I would be making!

The 'original' cookie batter was made on FRIDAY! That's right, FRIDAY... 4 days ago! So... here goes the story, mixed up the batter... then I wanted to let it chill for at least 2 hours (so I did), then I rolled out my cookies using Sally's tall cookie trick (OMG, this woman is brilliant, just like her baking). EPIC FAIL is all I can say, it was like one big flat cookie. Needless to say I was not impressed and slightly disgruntled. So, I decided to put my cookie batter in the fridge overnight? Again, another fail in the morning - not quite as bad as the first but still terrible. Then I got interrupted, my dad was having a big breakfast with friends from Sudbury, so back into the fridge the cookie batter went and off to dad's house we went! ... 10 hours later we made it home, lol! FINALLY I would attempt these cookies one last time in hopes that they would be a success. Again, they failed. I was heart broken. I studied hard, took my time writing the recipe and deciding on what ingredients would be used and how much and theoretically, they should have worked so what happened? I was completely confuzzled.

Then... OH MY GOD! As I was going over the steps in my head from when I mixed up my batter, I realized that I DOUBLED, yes, DOUBLED the amount of butter I used in my recipe!! I couldn't believe it! But at least now I knew why no matter how much chill time or how TALL I made those cookies, they just would never work!

So... I decided to mix up another batch! But, of course, my butter was cold so I cubed it to bring it up to room temperature while I bathed and put Leo to bed.

I sifted the dry, creamed the wet, and added the chocolate chips.

Then the batter went into the fridge overnight to chill, this momma was ready to SLEEP! I woke up the next morning and the first thing I did was preheat my oven and cut the caramels in half.

Then I rolled out a perfect 12  tall cookies and into the oven they went in batches of 6 (I didn't want to overcrowd and we only have a small apartment sized stove)! They baked for exactly 12 minutes and out they came, finally, a success!

Double Chocolate Caramel Filled Cake Batter Cookies

Yields 2 dozen cookies

1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 1/4 cups boxed chocolate cake batter mix
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup butter (room temperature)
1 egg
1 cup dark brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup chocolate chips
12 caramels (cut in half to make 24)

Method

1. Sift together flour, cake mix, baking powder and baking soda
2. Cream butter, sugar, egg, vanilla and salt in stand mixer
3. Add and mix in dry ingredients
4. Add and mix in chocolate chips
5. Cover with plastic wrap and chill in fridge at least 2 hours
6. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line baking sheet with parchment
7. Cover caramel piece with roughly 1 1/2 - 2 tbsp batter
8. Bake 8-12 minutes
9. Let cook 5 minutes then move to cooling rack
Note: Cookies will appear 'puffy' but will set once cool

Enjoy!