Baking with kids is a great way to hang out, create art, learn some math and science and just plain have fun. These are some of my favorite easy cookies to make with kids.
Right now we are spending quite a bit more time inside and with our families. Baking is a good way to spend time together, relieve stress and anxiety, and to create something wonderful. I used to be super nervous about baking with kids (you have to tell them to wash their hands SO MUCH), but now it’s one of my favorite things to do with the kiddos in my life. If baking with your kids makes you a little bit anxious, click here for my top 10 practical tips for baking with kids.
From Scratch Cookies
My personal favorite way to bake cookies. Most from scratch cookie recipes just require a few staple baker’s pantry ingredients and you can make almost anything here.
We’ll start with the classic chocolate chip cookies. These are the cookies I first learned to bake and they are the cookies that I bake the most often with the kiddos in my life. They are the perfect comfort food and make your house smell amazing! These cookies also work great for baking with multiple kids because you can divide up the measuring, stirring, scooping and everybody gets the chance to help. Some fun variations of this classic are these oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and these caramel chocolate chip cookies with sea salt.
Next up, these easy M&M brownie cookies. What is better than a batch of fudgey chocolate cookies studded with mini chocolate chips and bright M&M’s? Maybe a batch of fudgey chocolate cookies that only require about 15 minutes and one bowl to whip up?
These easy M&M brownie cookies are not fussy in the least but will taste like you are a master in the kitchen. A triple wham of chocolate from the cocoa powder, the mini chips, and the M&M’s, these babies are perfect for those days when you HAVE TO HAVE ALL THE CHOCOLATE RIGHT NOW!!!
Plus, that post has a nice educational lesson about cocoa powder, what it is, where it comes from, and how you use it. Delicious learning!
I used to make these peanut butter cookies so often when I was in high school that I had the recipe memorized. They are whipped up in one bowl in about 15 minutes. No mixer required. No chilling time required. You can go from itching for some cookies to eating cookies in about 45 minutes. Less if you’re fine with eating cookies that are slightly too hot straight off the pan. Which of course I am.
Fun and easy variations of peanut butter cookies: peanut butter chocolate chip cookies, peanut butter sandwich cookies and my favorite-peanut butter pizza
Everybody needs an easy, go-to rolled sugar cookie recipe that works every time. This one is mine and it hasn’t failed me yet. They taste great with a basic powdered sugar glaze or buttercream, or royal icing. It just depends on what your heard desires. They roll easily, bake up nice and flat, and if you chill the dough ahead of time, the spread is minimal. The awesome part about sugar cookies is that they are a science lesson and and an art project all rolled into one! No cookie cutters? No problem! Use drinking glasses to make round cookies or use a butter knife to cut out your own shapes!
Fun and easy variations: make these soft sour cream cookies instead. They’re a little bit fussier but they bake up nice and soft and are perfect with a dollop of cream cheese buttercream. Marbled sugar cookies are also super fun and waaay easier than they look.
Edible chocolate chip cookie dough. Technically all cookie dough is edible. But what I mean about edible cookie dough is cookie dough not intended to be baked. This edible cookie dough is made without eggs, leavening agents, and we cook the flour a little bit to eliminate any bacteria hiding in there. The right thing for when you want something sweet but don’t want to wait for it to bake.
To go one step further, I have made these cookie dough pretzel bites with an 8 year old and had great success (minus the fact that he argued with me that eating raw cookie dough was bad because that’s what he learned on Nailed It…). Don’t worry, a lesson about bacteria ensued.
Bar Cookies
All the deliciousness of cookies without all the hassle of scooping.
Magic cookie bars are really nice to make with younger kids because they don’t require very much precise measuring. Pretty much if you can melt butter and have a can opener you can make these cookies.
Soft sour cream sugar cookie bars are all the flavor of Lofthouse style sugar cookies without all the hassle of chilling, rolling, and cutting.
Cake Mix Cookies
I love cake mix cookies because pretty much all that’s required is a cake mix, a few tablespoons of milk and a stick of butter. Then, the sky’s the limit. These are a few of my favorites but you can customize based on whatever kind of cake mix is in your pantry:
Turtle brownie cookies are rich chocolatey cookies are studded with caramel bits and crunchy pecans. All of the flavor of traditional turtles with a 1/4 of the work!
These 5 ingredient red velvet cookies take less than a half hour to go from the bowl straight to your mouth! No mixer required! Perfect for little kids with short attention spans or bigger kids who want to try a cookie project on their own.
These cakies are about as easy as it gets for a cake mix cookie, nothing extra added in. Top with a dollop of buttercream and let the kiddos sprinkle away!
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Happy Baking!
Happy Baking!