Wonderful Gooey Butter Cookies

Gooey Butter Cookies

A clever twist on Gooey Butter Cake is making it into cookies. Ingredients:
1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 egg
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 (18.25 ounce) package yellow cake mix
1/4 cup confectioners' sugar
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
In a medium bowl, cream together the cream cheese and butter. Stir in the egg and vanilla. Add cake mix, and stir until well blended. Roll into 1inch balls and roll the balls in the confectioners' sugar. Place 1 inch apart onto an ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake for 10 to 13 minutes in the preheated oven. Remove from baking sheets to cool on wire racks.

Alternate Recipe that I used.
Ingredients:
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 large egg + 1 large egg yolk
1 cup + 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 + 1/8 teaspoon fine salt
1/3 cup powdered sugar
Instructions:
In a medium bowl, add the cream cheese and butter. Beat together with an electric mixer until fluffy, about 30 seconds.
Slowly add the sugar to the cream cheese mixture while continuously beating. Beat the sugar into the cream cheese mixture until light and fluffy, 1 minute.
Next, add the vanilla, whole egg, and egg yolk. Beat until combined.
In a separate small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Add this to the cream cheese mixture in three increments, beating in between each addition.
Chill the dough in the fridge for 30 minutes. This should not be optional.
Preheat the oven to 325-degrees, and line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
Have the powdered sugar ready in a shallow bowl nearby.
Scoop out a heaping tablespoon of dough, roll it in your hands to form a ball. Roll the dough into the powdered sugar before placing them evenly on the baking sheet.
Bake for 14 minutes. Keeping a close eye on these cookies, they should not brown in the oven. The top of the cookies will be puffed and slightly wet.
I think, no matter the recipe, you will be very pleased with these cookies. As will your guest.

Gooey Butter Cake

Hot and humid summers may be an unpleasant St Louis tradition, but there is another that is a little more fun, and very much more tasty...Gooey Butter Cake!
Gooey butter cake is a type of cake traditionally made in the American Midwest city of St. Louis. It is a flat and dense cake made with wheat cake flour, butter, sugar, and eggs, typically near an inch tall, and dusted with powdered sugar. Yum! At the bottom of the article is the Real St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake Recipe.

As the story goes, it is believed to have originated in the 1930's as a mistake by a St. Louis-area German American baker. The original bakery, owned by a John Hoffman, hired a new baker who accidentally inverted two ingredients (he was trying to make regular cake batter but reversed the proportions of butter and flour) resulting in a gooey cake that became a best seller in bakeries throughout the St. Louis area.
Another St. Louis baker, Fred Heimburger, also remembers the cake coming on the scene in the 1930's, as a slip up that became a popular hit and local acquired taste. He liked it well enough that Mr. Heimburger tried to promote Gooey butter cake by taking samples of it with him when he traveled out of St. Louis to visit other bakers in their shops. Are you ready to try your hand at it now?

Gooey Butter Cake Recipe:
Ingredients:
1 (18-ounce) package yellow cake mix
1 large egg
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, room temperature
2 eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
4 cups powdered (confectioners') sugar
Powdered (confectioners') sugar for dusting top
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease a 13- x 9-inch baking dish.
In a large mixing bowl, combine yellow cake mix, egg, and butter. Press mixture onto bottom of prepared baking dish; set aside.
In a medium bowl, beat cream cheese until creamy; add the 2 eggs and vanilla extract. Blend in powdered sugar until well mixed. Pour batter into the crust-lined baking pan.
Bake 30 to 40 minutes or until cake is nearly firm when you shake if (you want the center to be a little gooey, so do not over cook the cake). Remove from oven and let cake cool in the cake pan on a wire rack.
When cool, remove to a serving plate and sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Real St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake Recipe