Kitchen hacks - fresh-baked cookies anytime!

How many of you love warm, fresh-baked cookies?

Now how many of you love whipping together a batch (from scratch) every time that cookie-craving hits?

Sure you could buy pre-made cookie dough and cut it up every time you want a sweet treat

you could make your own from scratch, save lots of money, look like a ‘June Cleaver Mom’, and have dozens ready in minutes!

I know which way I’d go.

Just call me “Junie C”.

One of our favourite treats in this house is chocolate chip cookies; the kids love eating the raw dough (I know, shame on me) and Hubby and I love freshly baked, warm and gooey ones – so when I bake, I bake for freezer cookies.

This is our favourite chocolate chip cookie recipe from Allrecipes.com and when I make it, I double the batch, which makes about 15 dozen small freezer cookies.

Once the mixing is done I scoop out my little cookie balls and put them on a cookie sheet. (I just bought this cookie scoop – I had no idea that up until now my cookie balls were 3-4 times too big?! Now we have smaller balls, so we can eat more. lol)

I can fit about 60 per cookie sheet – they don’t need to be spaced too far apart, just enough so that they don’t freeze together. I set my sheets in the freezer for about 30 minutes and then transfer them to freezer bags. By pre-freezing them you prevent them from glomming together in one giant mass and are able to scoop out a few, or a lot, anytime you want.

My kids will pick one out here and there for a treat, and Hubby and I will make up a dozen freezer cookies on a weekend or as a quick but delicious dessert.

The key is to put the ice cream on while the cookie is still warm – sooooo gooooood!

Another thing I like to do with our freezer cookies is send a dozen over to friends’ houses when the kids have playdates. I don’t mean to put the parents to work by baking them, but again – cookies are so much better when they are warm and fresh. I send them in a baggie with directions for baking, but you could just as easily pre-bake them and send them with your child.

So far I’ve whipped up 2 dozen for us to eat and sent over a dozen to a neighbour’s, and I still have dozens of freezer cookies left for whenever the urge arises.

This works with most recipes as well – we keep a stash of coconut chewies in our freezer and I mix up a large batch of gingersnaps before the Holidays.

This is by far one of my favourite kitchen hacks – work once, eat often!