Homemade Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake

Last month we celebrated my oldest daughter, Aubrey, turning 7 on the 17th and my middle child, Faith, turning 5 on the 29th. For the past several years as January rolled around, I'd promptly email my favorite cake lady, Gretchen, to get on her schedule for our spring birthdays. If you have ever tasted or looked at one of her cakes, you know what I'm talking about...they are amazing!! Unfortunately, she has decided to suspend operations of her business , so I'm now on my own. And, since I have a slight aversion to grocery store cakes (not that they taste bad, they just tend to lack the originality that I like to mark special events with), I decided that until I find a replacement for my much loved cake lady, that I'd have to attempt something on my own. I asked my girls what kind of cake they'd like for their birthdays this year and they both begged for cookie cakes. I was quite relieved considering it seemed much less complicated than a fancy cake, as free hand decorating and hand writing is not my strength.

I decided to go ahead and purchase a reliable 16" Wilton cake pan from Michael's (using my 40% off coupon, of course!). The pizza pan I had was too small and wouldn't create a cookie that was the size of one of those giant ones you can get from Great American Cookie Company.....which is what I was going for.

I used my basic chocolate chip cookie recipe from Bread Becker's and simply pressed all of the dough the recipe makes into a the greased (sprayed with Pam) pan, leaving about a half an inch space around the edges for the dough to expand as it bakes.


Recipe for Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake:
(adapted from Bread Beckers Recipe Collection)

1 cup butter
1 cup Sucanat w/honey
1 cup Sucanat
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
3 1/2 cups freshly milled soft white wheat flour
1/4 cup ground flax seed
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/2-2 cups chocolate chips (I used half jumbo semi-sweet chocolate chips and half regular)

Cream butter and Sucanat making a grainy paste. Add eggs and vanilla and beat well. Mix dry ingredients and stir into creamed mixture. Add chocolate chips. Press all of dough into large round or rectangle pizza pan, leaving about 1/2 inch space between edge of pan to allow dough to spread while baking. Bake at 350 degrees for 15-18 minutes.

For the icing, instead of experimenting with a sucanat based icing (which I'm sure is fabulous), I decided to go with a tried and true icing recipe. I tried two different recipes, both were delish, but I'm probably a bit partial to the old-fashioned butter cream and the combo of chocolate and vanilla butter cream on Faith's cake was really tasty!

For Aubrey's cookie cake, I made this frosting I found on the Pioneer Woman's website.

For Faith's cookie cake, I made Wilton's Classic Butter Cream and Chocolate Butter Cream Icing.

The options are endless for decorating a cookie cake from dying the icing different colors to using a variety of sprinkles. This area is not my expertise, so I'll limit any more suggestions!


The cookie cake ended up being a big hit with both girls classes at school and one cookie cake recipe easily feeds a generous slice for about 15-20 people.

I will DEFINITELY be repeating this for many birthdays to come!

One last thing, having nothing to do with baking cookie cakes, but everything to do with birthday sweets!! I also had a fun time making a festive cupcake tower for both of my girls birthday parties. I experimented with a few cupcake recipes using my soft white wheat flour and while they tasted great, I kept getting a crumbly consistency. So, I committed what's a bit of a sin in the world of freshly milled baking and used store bought flour for the cupcakes and used a classic and reliable Martha Recipe for them. For the icing, I used the same Wilton Butter Cream Icing as I used in Faith's cookie cake above. I have a friend that has mastered the cupcakes using her soft white wheat, so I'll experiment more with that later on.


















*P.S. I made the cupcake toppers using designs I made in PowerPoint, then printed them out on card stock and used a round scallop punch. I then just taped lollipop sticks to the back of each. Now, I have a mini-break before round 3 of the spring birthdays when my sweet little guy turns three at the end of May.