Gideon's Bakery Copycat Giant Chocolate Chip Cookies from Buuck Farms Bakery

Gideon's Bakery Copycat Giant Chocolate Chip Cookies - made dough October 14, 2023 from Buuck Farms Bakery

1 cup butter, room temperature

3/4 cup (165 grams) dark brown sugar

1/4 cup (55 grams) granulated sugar

1 large egg

1 large egg yolk

2 teaspoons vanilla bean paste

1 cup (125 grams) all-purpose flour

1 1/4 cups (165 grams) bread flour

2 teaspoons cornstarch

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups mini semisweet chocolate chips, divided

1 1/2 cups milk chocolate chips

4-ounce semisweet chocolate bar, chopped

1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

flaky sea salt

1. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar for 5 minutes, scraping down the bottom and sides of the bowl to keep mixture even-textured.
2. Add egg, yolk, and vanilla bean paste and mix an additional 3 minutes.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk together all-purpose flour, bread flour, cornstarch, baking powder. baking soda and salt. Add to butter mixture in 2-3 additions, mixing on low speed after each addition until combined. Do not overmix.
4. Fold in 1/2 cup milk chocolate chips, 1/2 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips and the chopped chocolate bar.
5. Portion dough into six 6.5-ounce cookies and roll into balls. Cover and refrigerate for 10 minutes.
6. In a separate bowl, mix the remaining 1 cup each of semisweet chocolate chips, milk chocolate chips and mini semisweet chocolate chips.
7. Roll each dough ball into the chocolate chip mixture. Press the chocolate chips into the dough so that they stick. Coat the entire dough balls except for the bottoms. Cover and refrigerate for 24 hours.
8. When ready to bake, preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. Bake 2 cookies per sheet, leaving plenty of room between cookies. Bake for 16-18 minutes or until edges are set. Remove the cookies from the oven and bang the baking sheet on the counter 4-5 times to flatten the cookies slightly. Use a small rubber spatula to gently press any runaway edges into a neater circle. Press extra chocolate chips into any bare spots and sprinkle the cookies with flaky sea salt if desired. Let rest on baking sheets for 15 minutes before transferring to wire rack to cool completely.

This is the second of three copycat recipes for Gideon's Bakehouse cookies that I've tried from Buuck Farms Bakery. I'd actually made a Gideon's Bakehouse copycat recipe for chocolate chip cookies several years ago from a different source. 

But Buuck Farms Bakery seems to have more copycat recipes for Gideon's Bakehouse than other sources so I thought I'd try several of them as I was in a big-cookie baking mood. The funny thing is, back in 2019, I'd never heard of Gideon's Bakehouse and didn't know what it was. I had some vague notion it was a bakery "somewhere in Florida" and their appeal included covering the entire outside of a cookie with the add-ins, which, in this case, were chocolate chips. I hadn't realized it was a Disney bakery and highly popular with Disney aficionados and others. 

It appears to have a devoted following, much like Levain Bakery and other famous bakeries. I've never been to Gideon's Bakehouse so copycat recipes will have to do for me.

There's something really appealing about oversized chocolate chip cookies literally covered with three kinds of chocolate chips: semisweet, mini semisweet and milk chocolate chips. What's not to love?

Even if you cover the dough balls completely with chocolate chips, the cookies spread during baking so there will be gaps. No problem: once you take the cookies out of the oven, gently press more chips in the open cookie spaces. I didn't need a completely covered cookie but still covered a fair amount of the surface with chips.

I forgot about my double panning trick when I baked these so the bottom did get more brown than I preferred. These weren't dry-overbaked but they could've used less baking time. They were dense and, surprisingly, not as sweet as I expected. Maybe all those chocolate chips got in the way of the brown sugar flavor coming through. Or I prefer more cookie and fewer chips. I might like the concept of this cookie (overloaded with chips) more than the cookie reality. The other copycat I tried in 2019 was better to me, probably because I didn't load up with the chips as much.  

Gideon's Bakehouse Copycat Coffee Cake Cookies from Buuck Farms Bakery

Gideon's Bakehouse Copycat Coffee Cake Cookies - made dough October 17, 2023 from Buuck Farms Bakery

Double Baked Butter Crumbs

6 tablespoons butter, melted

3 tablespoons brown sugar

3 tablespoons granulated sugar

2 teaspoons cinnamon

3/4 cup (95 grams) all-purpose flour 

Cookies

1 cup butter, cold and cubed

3/4 cup (165 grams) brown sugar

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1 large egg

1 large egg yolk

1 tablespoon vanilla bean paste or 1 1/2 tablespoons vanilla extract

1 1/4 cups (165 grams) all-purpose flour

1 1/4 cups (165 gams) cake flour

2 teaspoons cornstarch

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon salt

Cinnamon Streusel

1 tablespoon cinnamon

1/2 cup (110 grams) brown sugar

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

6 tablespoons butter, soft but not melted

1. Double Baked Butter Crumbs: preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. In a small mixing bowl, stir together brown sugar, granulated sugar, cinnamon and flour until well combined.
3. Pour in the melted butter and mix until crumbly. It should have the consistency of wet sand; add extra melted butter if too dry.
4. Pour mixture onto prepared sheet pan and spread into an even layer.
5. Bake for 15 minutes then cool. Break up any extra large pieces but leave a variety of shapes and sizes. Set aside.
6. Make the cookies: in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the brown sugar, granulated sugar and cold cubed butter for 5 minutes or until the mixture is light and fluffy. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl to keep mixture even textured.
7. Add egg, egg yolk and vanilla bean paste and mix for 2 minutes.
8. In a separate bowl, whisk together all-purpose flour, cake flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. 
9. Add dry ingredients to butter mixture in 2-3 additions, mixing on low speed until just combined. Do not overmix.
10. Portion dough into 18 2-ounce portions of dough onto a parchment-lined baking sheet. Chill for 10 minutes.
11. Cinnamon streusel: combine all streusel ingredients and mix together.
12. Assemble cookies: take the chilled dough balls and flatten into rounds. You'll need 3 rounds for each cookie. Take one round and spread with about 2 teaspoons of the streusel mixture, almost to the edges of the round. Top with another round and spread another 2 teaspoons of streusel mixture. Top with a third round and roll into a tall ball. Repeat with remaining rounds to end up with 6 giant cookies.
13. Roll each cookie dough ball in the butter crumbs, coating sides and tops completely. Cover and freeze for 15 minutes.
14. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. Place 2 cookies per sheet, spaced apart to allow for spread. Bake 15-20 minutes. 
15. Remove from oven and while the cookies are still hot, use a spoon or small rubber spatula to press the edges into place and create more of a perfect circle. Fill in any empty spaces with leftover butter crumbs and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Let cool on baking sheets for at least 10 minutes before transferring to wire rack to cool completely.

This is a longer-than-usual post as this cookie has a longer-than-usual number of components and parts to it. I actually had to make it over several days as I didn't have time to spend on it all at once. 

First you make the butter crumbs mixture, bake it, let it cool then break it into pieces and crumbs. You'll need that for later.

Second, you make the cookie dough and weigh it out into 2-ounce portions which you roll into balls, chill then roll out into flat rounds. Or round-ish shapes. I faithfully weighed the dough into 2 ounce pieces but I only ended up with 14 2-ounce balls, not 18. I chilled the dough balls for a few minutes then sandwiched each ball between small pieces of parchment paper and rolled to flat shapes.

Third, you make the streusel while the small dough balls are chilling. My streusel wasn't a crumb mixture; it was more of a streusel paste. Which I spread over a flat piece of dough, covered with another piece, spread more streusel over it then topped with a third rolled-out piece of cookie dough.

Once the streusel is sandwiched between the three layers of cookie dough, pinch the edges to seal then ball up to make a smooth dough ball. You want to make sure the ball is sealed up well so none of the streusel paste leaks out during baking.

Depending on how soft or warm your dough ball is, you might want to chill it for a few minutes before covering with the butter crumbs. If your dough is too sticky, it'll be hard to handle. If it's too chilled though, it's harder to keep the butter crumbs stuck to it.

Do your best to cover all but the bottom of the dough ball with the butter crumbs. Your butter crumbs can/should be in various sizes and pieces, even with some small to large-ish crumbs.

The tricky thing with baking such large cookies, especially if you bake it from chilled or frozen dough (which I did) is the bottom will bake faster and brown almost well before the rest of the cookie which can lead to a harder bottom crust.

You can deal with this by double panning the baking pans to help the cookie bake more evenly. Or line a wire rack with a silpat and bake in a single baking sheet. Either way should work.

Final verdict? This was freaking delicious. Yes, a pain with more steps than your average cookie but this isn't an average cookie. The inside was moist and chewy, the streusel adds more moisture and cinnamon-brown sugar flavor while the butter crumbs add a nice crunch on top.

I've never had the real thing from Gideon's Bakehouse which is a specialty bake shop in Disney Springs in Florida and they don't ship online so it's unlikely I'll ever get a taste of the real thing. So I don't know how it compares to the original. But this copycat serves up a pretty good cookie.

Brown Sugar Cookies from Dinner then Dessert

Brown Sugar Cookies - made dough October 2, 2023 from Dinner then Dessert

14 tablespoons unsalted butter

1/4 cup granulated sugar

2 cups dark brown sugar, packed

2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 large egg

1 large egg yolk

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
2. In a skillet, melt 10 tablespoons butter over medium high heat. Stir constantly until butter starts to brown, about 3-4 minutes. Remove from heat, pour into bowl and add remaining butter; set aside.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk together granulated sugar, 1/4 cup brown sugar, flour, baking soda, and baking powder.
4. Add remaining brown sugar and salt to melted butter and whisk until smooth. Whisk in egg, egg yolk and vanilla.
5. Combine butter mixture with dry ingredients, stirring until a dough forms.
6. Portion dough into golf-ball size dough balls and evenly space on baking sheets. Sprinkle tops with sugar.
7. Bake for 12-14 minutes or until edges are set and middles no longer look raw. Remove from oven and let rest on baking sheet for several minutes before transferring to wire rack to cool completely.

I have mixed feelings about this cookie. On the one hand, the dough was easy to make and handled really well. It didn't spread too much and stayed reasonably thick.

On the other hand, it was incredibly sweet. I knew it would be sweet based on the amount of brown sugar in the recipe and I do like brown sugar cookies as it adds a nice flavor to a regular sugar cookie.

But holy bovine animal, this was sweet. I don't know if my taste buds are getting more sensitive to sugar as (believe it or not), I've actually been eating healthier for the past few months. A salad a day! Carrot sticks! Salmon! No rice! Okay, that last one is easier than cutting back on pasta or bread. But still...

Or this genuinely is that sweet. Or both. In either case, I had to admit I could only eat half of the taste test cookie. So, not sure I'd make this again. Hopefully the military service members I sent these to have a good sweet tooth and would enjoy them.

Crumbl Cookies review #57 - Snickerdoodle Sandwich 2.0 (test cookie)

Crumbl Cookies review #57 - Snickerdoodle Sandwich 2.0 (test cookie), visited October 11, 2023 

The October 11, 2023 test cookies were hardly anything new as one flavor was the skillet cookie which had already been tested and the other was the snickerdoodle sandwich again.

But presumably Crumbl made some tweaks to both and was testing those tweaks. My store opted for the snickerdoodle sandwich and I enjoyed that one last time so I got it again this week.

This new version hardly rates its own post as the cookies and filling seem exactly the same and the only difference I could tell is the white glaze drizzle on top. It just seemed like vanilla icing. I couldn't tell you if it was white chocolate or cream cheese or just powdered sugar and milk whisked together to make the icing. 

Like last time, I enjoyed the cookies more than the filling but it's still a good sandwich cookie. I prefer it plain though so I hope Crumbl doesn't go with the icing version. It might look prettier but to me, it doesn't add anything to the cookie other than more work for the employees to make the icing and drizzle it and more mess for the customers to eat it. 

Crumbl Cookies review #56 - Oatmeal Mallow and Graham Cracker Fudge Sandwich (test cookie)

Crumbl Cookies review #56 - Oatmeal Mallow and Graham Cracker Fudge Sandwich (test cookie) 

Believe it or not, I'm slowing down on my Crumbl consumption. I know, I know, you can't tell by the number of Crumbl posts I'm still making. And Crumbl cookies I seem to keep buying. I keep telling myself to skip a week or three, just to catch up with the stash in my freezer, most notably the 6-pack I bought during their birthday promotion, which is almost entirely still intact, given I only eat 1/4 of a cookie a day.

But, alas, I'm not always good at listening to myself and there was one cookie I wanted to try in the regular lineup this particular week and that was the Oatmeal Mallow Sandwich. Crumbl's been doing a fair number of sandwich cookies lately which is a better value when shelling out almost 5 bucks for a cookie which is technically two cookies and a filling when you get a sandwich cookie. Good value, right? The finance nerd in me and the first generation immigrant who grew up shopping sales and clipping coupons can't resist it. Or so I tell myself.

Oatmeal Mallow Sandwich Cookie

In any case, my rationalization was justified as I enjoyed this cookie. I let it come to room temperature first (can't abide chilled cookies). At room temp, the cookies are softer in texture and the filling is more mushy. I would probably have eaten this more neatly if the cookies were room temp and the filling was chilled but neatness be damned as this was a really good cookie. The cookies themselves were not quite as good as the oatmeal cookies used with the Iced Oatmeal but still very good nonetheless. Perfect balance of flavor and texture. It is a bit sweet so I ended up scraping most of the filling out and just enjoying the cookies.

Graham Cracker Fudge Sandwich

One of the main reasons I find it difficult to "just skip a week" is the test cookie. My store is a tester store and nearly every Wednesday they offer a test cookie flavor. Only a handful of stores are test stores and I feel I need to support my store and show my approval of their tester status by buying their test cookie each week. Yeah, I'm loyal like that. Ha.

This week's test cookie was another sandwich cookie. Value galore this week, amiright?

If you like the Keebler fudge striped cookies, you'd like this cookie. If you're a s'mores fan, you'd like it better if the filling was marshmallow instead of fudge. I've seen pictures online from other tester stores where they weren't as generous with the fudge filling as my store was (shoutout to the Sparks store as they deliver every time). 

I am neither a Keebler fudge striped cookie fan nor a s'mores fan so, to me, this cookie was good, but not great. Nothing wrong with it. The cookie texture was on point, the graham cracker flavor came through and I even enjoyed the filling which reminded me of the frosting on the Crumbl Dirt Cake cookie. But my sweet tooth would've preferred more of a brown sugar base cookie instead of a graham cracker one. Which would defeat the purpose of a graham cracker fudge sandwich. So I think this cookie delivers what it promises. It doesn't hit my top 5 but goes into the category of "good, glad I tried it, don't need to get again". 

This was also chilled so that's probably another reason I'm not a big fan. It tastes better at room temperature. Between the two (chilled, sandwich) cookies this week, Oatmeal Mallow was the winner.