Soft Animal Cookie with White Chocolate Chips Cookies
A soft cookie packed with Circus Animal cookies, white chocolate chips, and sprinkles. these cookies are fun to make year round and will most likely bring back a lot of nostalgia! I love making these year round but think they have such a fun Valentine’s vibe! These cookies are also made with one of my favorite baking secret ingredients! Read below!
Want to see some of my other recipes that are a little more simple? Check these ones out:
Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies with Creamy Frosting
Brown Butter Fruity Pebbles with Marshmallows Cookies
Soft Animal Cookie with White Chocolate Chips Cookies
Were Circus Animal Cookies one of the best parts of anyone else’s childhoods, or was it just me? Something is telling me it can’t possibly be just me, haha! While I think the go-to cookie for Valentine’s (for most people at least) is a classic frosted sugar cookie, I wanted to think up something that still screamed “Happy Valentine’s” while also being something a little different!
These cookies are absolutely delicious, and if you do it right, they will be packed with crunchy, delicious pink and white Circus Animal Cookies inside. The dough has a touch of brown sugar to it but is more heavy on the white granulated sugar side. You’ll also add a hefty amount of white chocolate chips to these yummy cookies as well as some fun sprinkles! During the Valentine’s season I love walking down the baking aisles and seeing the different kinds of sprinkles available! These cookies would also be a lot of fun to make year round with rainbow sprinkles.
One of the reasons I love this recipe is because it uses one of my secret baking ingredients: dry vanilla pudding mix. I love using dry pudding mix in my cookies. I think it adds such a delicious vanilla flavor to my cookies as well as contributes to them having such a yummy texture.
As always, the success of these cookies is dependent on you adding the correct amount of flour as well as on the temperature of the dough. Make sure to use cold butter or to refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before baking if you’re worried your dough has sat out too long and become too soft. Read more below to learn how I suggest measuring flour.
How do you measure flour?
To correctly measure flour, mix your flour with a spoon to make sure it becomes unpacked. Then, take a spoonful and pour it into your measuring cup. DO NOT pack the flour into the cup, just let it fall into place. Scoop until the flour is overflowing, then take a knife and use it to level the flour to the top of the cup. Using the correct amount of flour is crucial to baking success!
How to Make This Recipe
To make the cookies you will need the following ingredients:
- Cold Butter, cut into tablespoons
- Granulated Sugar
- Light Brown Sugar
- 2 Large Eggs
- Vanilla Pudding (Dry mix only- 3.4 package)
- Baking Powder
- Salt
- Baking Soda
- All Purpose Flour
- White Chocolate Chips
- ¼-1/2 C Rainbow (or Valentine’s mix) Sprinkles (non pareils)
- Circus Animal Cookies (smash into smaller chunks)
MIX. To make the cookies, cut COLD butter into tablespoon chunks and mix on low in an electric mixer until somewhat softened. Add the sugars and dry vanilla pudding mix and cream on low until well combined. Add in the eggs one at a time and mix on low until the ingredients are well mixed. Sift together dry ingredients: flour, baking soda, and baking powder. Fold in the white chocolate chips, Circus Animal Cookie chunks, and sprinkles.
MEASURE. Measure cookie dough into 3 ounce round mounds of dough. Your cookie dough should be cold or else your cookies will fall flat! (Pop dough into the refrigerator for 30 minutes if you are nervous that your dough is too soft/warm.) Place cookie dough mounds on a lined cookie sheet about 2-3 inches apart from one another.
BAKE. Place cookie mounds onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper or silicone mats to bake at 375 for 10ish minutes. When edges of cookies are set and the tops begin to brown, remove from the oven. Allow cookies to finish baking on the warm sheet, at least 20 minutes, before removing. You can top your cookies with a full Circus Animal cookie! You could also drizzle with some yummy white chocolate!
Soft Circus Animal with White Chocolate Chips and Sprinkles Cookies
Ingredients
Wet Ingredients
- 1 C Unsalted butter, COLD, cut into tablespoons
- 1 1/2 C Granulated Sugar
- 1/2 C Light Brown Sugar
- 2 large Eggs
- 1 3.4 oz Vanilla Pudding, Dry Mix
Dry Ingredients
- 3 C All Purpose Flour
- 1 tsp Baking Soda
- 1 tsp Baking Powder
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1/4-1/2 C Sprinkles (I love nonpareils!)
- 1 C White Chocolate Chips
- 1 1/2 C Animal Cookies, crushed into different sizes (make sure you have a variety of large, medium, and small!)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
- Cut cold butter into tablespoon chunks and put in mixer. Mix on low until butter is somewhat softened. Add sugars and dry vanilla pudding mix. Mix on low until well combined.
- Add eggs, one at a time. Mix until there are no chunks.
- Sift together dry ingredients. Add to mixer and mix on low until well combined, scraping the sides of the bowl.
- Crush animal cookies (I like to put them in a Ziploc bag and crush with my rolling pin) into different sizes.
- Add white chocolate chips, sprinkles, and animal cookie chunks. Fold into cookie dough.
- Weigh cookie dough mounds into 3 oz balls. Cookie mounds should be tall. If your cookie dough feels soft or warm, your cookies will fall and spread. Refrigerate cookie dough for at least 30 minutes if you are concerned.
- Place cookie dough mounds about 2 inches apart on a lined baking sheet.
- Bake for 9-11 minutes. Cookies will be done when the edges are set and the tops are starting to brown. Allow cookies to finish baking on hot sheet once removed from oven for at least 20 minutes.
- Place an animal cookie on top or add a drizzle of white chocolate chips to your cookies!
