Crumbl Cookies review #74: Cookie Butter Tres Leches Cake (tester) and Butter Cake

Crumbl Cookies review #74: Cookie Butter Tres Leches cake (tester) visited June 24, 2024 and Butter Cake, visited June 26, 2024

I think Crumbl is changing its testing format. It used to be a tester would be released (almost) every Wednesday at all of its test stores. They went through a period of not having testers at all and now, recently, it appears a tester would only come to a limited number of test stores and it would be available all week.  At least that's what I've found lately with the Cookies and Cream Cheesecake tester and the Nanaimo Bar Cookie tester.

They don't seem to do a tester every week either but that could also be because I haven't always paid attention every week. Fortunately I paid attention this week and even more fortunately, my store seems to be one of the limited number of test stores who continue to have test products available.

I say fortunately because y'all know my love of the Tres Leches Cake Crumbl had awhile back. It appeared to be successful enough for Crumbl to test a taste variation of it in the form of a Cookie Butter Tres Leches. You also know my love of cookie butter.

Cookie Butter Tres Leches Cake

So I was already predisposed to like this cake and I did. I won't say it was as good as the original as I think I prefer the original with its cinnamon overtones in the topping. But still, cookie butter.... Cookie butter isn't a particularly strong flavor when blended into baked goods but this had enough flavoring to be a cookie butter tres leches cake. My store does the tres leches really well. This was neither too soggy or too dry. It was delicious. I wouldn't be sorry if/when they have the original tres leches again but this one is a good substitute in the meantime. At my store, this had a $1.49 upcharge so the total was $5.98 plus tax.

I also have to admit, contrary to what I posted about the cinnamon square and how I go to Crumbl for cookies, not cakes I have to eat with a fork or spoon, I was wrong. Crumbl has done well with these little cakes so far and I was so wrong from my original opinion that I've actually been going to Crumbl more for their cakes than their cookies lately.

Butter Cake

Which brings us to the Butter Cake, which, besides the Cookie Butter Tres Leches tester, was the only thing I wanted from this week's menu. I've already tried a non-chocolate version of the Pretzel Pie, the Lemon Cupcake and the Honey Bun. I had zero interest in the peanut butter and jelly (I don't like jelly) or the semisweet (I prefer milk chocolate).

But the butter cake was intriguing. I'm already a fan of Crumbl's Kentucky Butter Cake cookie and I like butter cakes in general anyway. This one had a $0.99 upcharge so it was $5.48 at my store plus tax.

Okay, wow, to cut to the chase, I loved this Butter Cake. Loved. As in, I could easily forego Crumbl cookies from now on and live on a caloric high (literally) with their cakes. Especially this one. It was freaking delicious and is one of the reasons I'm publishing this post now while there's still time for people to get this by Saturday. If you're on the fence about this one, jump off, run, don't walk, to your nearest Crumbl. It was freaking amazing.

I loved 3 things about this cake and liked the 4th. First, the cake itself was absolutely delicious in both buttery goodness and perfect, slightly dense, moist cake texture. Second, the sugar crystals around the outside provided the best texture contrast with the crunch and added sweetness to the cake. Third, the butter glaze was perfect, adding a nice buttery flavor to enhance the cake. The vanilla bean whipped cream was more of a like than a love because you know my bias against whipped cream. But even that was still good as it was reminiscent of the vanilla bean mousse in the skillet cookie. If they had used the mousse from that cookie instead of the whipped cream, my like would shoot to love.

But, regardless of the whipped cream, I still loved this cookie overall. So much so that I may get another one this week and do another double workout in case I eat it all again instead of virtuously storing in the freezer for another time. We'll see.

Cinnamon Vanilla White Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies from Great Taste Buds

Cinnamon Vanilla White Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies - made dough May 15, 2024 from Great Taste Buds

1 cup butter, room temperature

3/4 cup granulated sugar

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 large eggs

2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla

2 cups old-fashioned oats

1 1/2 cups + 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon

12 ounces white chocolate chips

1. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter for 2-3 minutes, until light and creamy. Add granulated sugar and beat to combine. Add brown sugar and beat to combine. Scrape down bottom and sides of bowl to keep mixture even textured.
2. Add eggs and vanilla, mixing to combine. Add oats and beat to combine.
3. Add flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon, mixing on low speed until just combined. Fold in chocolate chips.
4. Portion dough into golf-ball size dough balls and flatten slightly. Cover and chill for several hours or overnight.
5. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper and evenly space dough balls. Bake 12-14 minutes or until edges are set and middles no longer look raw. Remove from heat and let rest on baking sheets for several minutes before transferring to wire rack to cool completely.

Back to cookies for military care packages. I've been sending care packages all this time but mostly recipes I've already made before there was no need to post them again. This is a new one I've had on my pinterest board for awhile and meant to try. 

I like to send oatmeal cookies since they're usually pretty sturdy and mail well. During summer, I don't typically send anything with white chocolate since white chocolate has a lower melting temperature and, on their way to hot desert climates, they will melt. But when baked into cookies, I just try to keep them inside the cookie and not on top, so they don't arrive too messy.

These were pretty good, nice and chewy with slightly crisp edges. They are a trifle sweet, especially with the white chocolate. The cinnamon flavor wasn't very strong so if you like cinnamon, increase the cinnamon in the dough by another half to full teaspoon.

Cold Oven Pound Cake from Food Gal

Cold Oven Pound Cake - made June 13, 2024 from Food Gal (original recipe from Cheryl Day's Treasury of Southern Baking by Cheryl Day)

3 1/2 cups (438 grams) unbleached all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon fine sea salt

1 1/2 cups whole milk

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

3 sticks (1 1/2 cups) unsalted butter, room temperature

3 cups (600 grams) granulated sugar

6 large eggs, room temperature

confectioners' sugar for dusting, optional

1. Butter a 10-inch Bundt pan and lightly dust with flour, shaking out the excess.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt; set aside.
3. In a small bowl, whisk together milk and vanilla.
4. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low and gradually add the sugar. Increase the speed to medium-high and continue beating for 2-3 minutes, until the mixture is very light and fluffy,
5. Reduce speed to low and add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Scrape down the sides and bottom of bowl as needed to keep mixture even textured.
6. Alternately, add dry ingredients and milk mixture, mixing on low speed after each addition until fully incorporated.
7. Pour batter into prepared pan and spread evenly with a spatula. Place the pan on the middle rack of the cold oven and set oven to 325 degrees.
8. Bake for 60-70 minutes or until the cake is golden on top and a toothpick inserted in the thickest part of the cake comes out clean. Let cake cool in the pan on a wire rack for 20 minutes then invert onto another rack. Turn right side up and let cool completely.
9. Dust cooled cake generously with confectioners' sugar, if desired.

If you see me making more cakes and frosted cookies or any other baked goods that don't ship well, you know that means I'm getting out more and bringing desserts to local gatherings. In this case, I was giving financial literacy sessions and teaching local women in my area about investing in the stock market, retirement planning, estate planning and budgeting. For this particular occasion, one of the attendees offered to host at her house so one of the desserts I made was this pound cake.

I love me a good pound and I was intrigued by this one because you start it in a cold oven (hence the name), meaning no need to preheat. You make the batter, pour it into the bundt pan, put it in the oven then turn the oven on. Unlike lighter cakes with leavening agents, pound cakes don't need that initial heat to activate anything since any air in the batter comes from beating the butter and sugar together and not from baking powder or baking soda.

I have to say, this turned out amazingly delicious. I did use Kerrygold European butter for that extra buttery flavor and that worked well. The texture was that perfect dense pound cake texture and I love the simplicity of this cake. 

If I had to quibble about anything, I did find the crust a little too crusty. That developed from the longer baking time, especially starting from a cold oven. But still, it's not a dealbreaker and this was a delicious cake, perfect for hot summer weather. 

I was asked for the recipe by a couple of the participants who also enjoyed the cake and you can't ask for a more sincere compliment than that.

Soft Cinnamon Roll Cookies from Divas Can Cook

Soft Cinnamon Roll Cookies - made June 12, 2024 from Divas Can Cook 

Cookies

3/4 cup granulated sugar

2 tablespoons butter-flavored shortening

2 tablespoons butter, room temperature

1 egg, room temperature

1/4 cup buttermilk

1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/8 teaspoon salt

Cinnamon Sugar mixture

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 tablespoon cinnamon

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

Cream Cheese Frosting

2 ounces cream cheese, room temperature

2 tablespoons butter, room temperature

1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons powdered sugar

2-3 teaspoons milk

splash of vanilla extract

1. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together sugar, butter and shortening. Mix in egg, buttermilk and vanilla extract.
2. In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
3. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix on low speed until a soft dough forms. Place dough in a plastic bag and flatten. Refrigerate for at least an hour or up to overnight.
4. Cinnamon-sugar mixture: in a small bowl, stir together brown sugar, cinnamon and melted butter.
5. When ready to bake, mix together 1 tablespoon flour and 1 tablespoon powdered sugar. Generously sprinkle over a nonstick work surface and over a rolling pin.
6. Remove chilled dough from refrigerator and roll into a 12 x 9-inch rectangle about 1/4" thick. Brush surface of dough with melted butter.
7. Immediately sprinkle the brown sugar-cinnamon mixture into an even layer, pressing down gently int the dough.
8. Starting with the longest side, gently and quickly roll dough into a tight log. Roll log in plastic wrap and place on a tray.
9. Freeze for 30 minutes or until roll is firm enough to cut without squishing when cutting.
10. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and line baking sheets with parchment paper.
11. Slice log into 1-inch thick slides using a serrated knife and evenly space 2 inches apart on lined baking sheets. Pinch the ends of the cookies together to prevent roll from unraveling during baking. Bake for 10-12 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool on wire rack.
12. Prepare glaze: combine cream cheese, butter, powdered sugar, milk and vanilla.
13. While cookies are still warm, brush with glaze, allowing the glaze to melt down into the folds of the cookie. Let glaze set and cookies cool completely.

This was a half-success, half-failure. And definitely better suited for making in cooler weather. Of course, I didn't know that until it was too late. But part of trying new recipes is making these discoveries, lol. I followed the recipe exactly as laid out and that might've been my first mistake. The dough was too soft and sticky when mixed and could've used more flour. I didn't add more though and instead hoped the chilling process would make the dough easier to handle. 

The easiest way to make a roughly square-ish shape of dough is to roll it out while in a gallon-size ziploc freezer bag.

That definitely helped when rolling out the dough as the plastic bag protected the rolling pin from the sticky dough. But - you guessed it - the dough was too soft to come out of the bag and still maintain its shape, even chilled. I cut the bag open and gingerly peeled it off but the dough threatened to tear and fall apart, even after being chilled for almost an hour. I had to use a lot of flour on the parchment paper the dough sat on during rolling, on the rolling pin and on the dough to make it even close to manageable.

As with cinnamon roll dough, then you sprinkle the cinnamon-brown sugar mixture over the cookie dough into an even-ish layer then you roll it up into a log. This was the comic portion of the process as the dough was too soft to roll properly or tightly, which is what you need to make a decent-looking semblance of a cinnamon roll. Plus, there was so much filling, it made it difficult to keep the dough in a tight roll.

I froze the log for several hours but that still didn't matter, as you can tell from the cut cookies. The log of dough was still soft and still refused to roll into an actual round shape but remained flattishly oval. Oy.

At this point, I assumed these would spread spectacularly given how soft the dough stubbornly remained. So I put a few in cupcake liners as an experiment and baked the rest as intended to see the spread.

Surprisingly, they didn't spread as much as I expected given the softness of the (frozen) dough. And they even looked more cinnamon roll-ish than I expected. Yes, still janky but recognizable.

But the swirl of the "cinnamon roll" didn't matter as these were meant to be covered with cream cheese frosting. And that's the next place these went awry. As you can tell from the picture, I didn't beat the cream cheese enough to get the lumps out before adding the rest of the frosting ingredients. Sigh. Rookie error.

So then I tried to cover my frosting sins by sprinkling some Penzey's cinnamon over the top. LOLOLOL.

The bottom line, after all my baking mishaps, is these cookies weren't bad. Not quite a snickerdoodle but a good sugar cookie, liberally flavored with brown sugar. Which was the biggest drawback as I found the brown sugar filling a bit too sweet. There was too much brown sugar in the filling so I would cut that back and let the cinnamon in the filling come out a bit more. I'm not going to say "next time" as I don't know if I would make these again. If I did, I would definitely add more flour and cut back on the brown sugar in the filling. And beat the cream cheese properly for the frosting.

Stamped Cookies #40 from Constellation Inspiration

Stamped Cookies #40 - made dough June 7, 2024 from Constellation Inspiration

227 grams (1 cup) unsalted butter, room temperature

115 grams (1 cup) powdered sugar

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

260grams (2 cups + 3 tablespoons) all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter, powdered sugar and vanilla at medium speed until combined and fluffy, 1-2 minutes.
2. Add flour and salt; mix on low speed until just combined.
3. Place dough atop a large piece of parchment paper and cover with another large piece of parchment paper. Roll dough to an even thickness, 1/4-1/3" thick. Refrigerate for 10-15 minutes.
4. Remove dough from refrigerate and lift off the top piece of parchment paper. Stamp and cut out cookies. Cover and freeze stamped cookies for at least 30 minutes.
5. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. Evenly space frozen stamped cookies. Bake 12-14 minutes or until lightly golden brown. Remove from oven and let rest on baking sheet for several minutes before transferring to wire rack to cool completely.

This is the third of three recipes I made for dessert for Ronald McDonald House and the second one for stamped cookies that I dropped off last week. 

This dough was harder to work with than the other one as it softened quickly. It was 90-degree weather when I made it so I had to chill it a few times between rolling out and stamping to be able to get decent stamped impressions. 

This also didn't hold some of the finer details in the stamps, both because the dough was too soft when I tried stamping and also because more of the smaller details baked out or blurred during baking.

However, despite all that, these were delicious. More of a regular butter cookie rather than shortbread. The butter flavor was more prominent and the bite was soft but chewy, like a good butter cookie, rather than the crisp snap of a shortbread. I liked both stamped cookie recipes but for a good butter cookie, I have to give the nod to this one. I need to make this again once the weather cools and see if I can get the stamped impressions to hold better.