These Six-Ingredient Cake Mix Halloween Monster Cookies are the perfect 'scary' treat to bake with your kids. These Halloween cookies do not require special ingredients or difficult decorating techniques so anyone can make them. And you can customize them with different colors and candy!
Is August too early for Halloween? It might be, but my 4 year old is super excited for Halloween this year, so I decided to bake these Six-Ingredient Cake Mix Halloween Monster cookies with her.
So the truth of the matter is that as cute as these cookies may look, they did make me cry a little bit. Lol. I started off with the idea of making purple cookies with green eyes so that the cookies would look like aliens.
But the thing is, purple colored cookie dough while baking turns into this weird greyish purple zombie color which is neither cute nor appetizing! Also, I conveniently forgot that 'alien' cookies would definitely need antennas and ears.
Check out my Ultimate Guide for Cake Mix Cookies (PLUS 10 Cake Mix Cookie recipes in the post)
However, I had very luckily also colored some of the batter into red (kind of pink) and green as well. So what we ended up with were these 'monster' cookies but initially they had no smiles. So they just looked weird and incomplete. By this time, I was super frustrated with the cookies, my 4 year old was trying to sneak off with the grey-purple zombie cookies AND the 7 month old baby was generally in a bad mood. Anyway, I resorted to drawing on smiles with the edible marker pen and was sure these cookies wouldn't be coming on the blog.
But you know what? I liked how they turned out, and I like how easy they are for busy moms. No intricate icing skills required for these Halloween Monster Cookies!
Know any Harry Potter fans? This kid friendly Polyjuice Potion sure does pack a punch! 🙂
So, my honest advice? Don't try to bake in the evening when the kids have entered into the 'witching' hour and everything is a chaos.
Don't let me discourage you, though. This recipe is SUPER easy. If I could do it with the two kids, while also serving dinner in between then you can definitely do it too. Trust me. I have zero decorating skills, and I still think these Six-Ingredient Cake Mix Halloween Monster Cookies turned out super cute! 🙂
Ingredients for these Six-Ingredient Cake Mix Halloween Monster Cookies:
- A box of white cake mix.
- Oil
- Eggs
- Food coloring
- Skittles or m&m's for the monster eyes.
- Black edible marker pen for drawing on the eyes and smiles on the monster cookies.
Some Tips & Tricks
- Use gel food coloring to get bright colored cookies. Also, not every color works great. I first tried to make purple cookies and something just happens to the color purple when the cookies are baked and they become an unsightly greyish purple cookies. So I used green and red gel colors, and they turned out great. I think a bright light blue would work great too with these cookies. Try to use gel food coloring though, and not regular food colors as gel colors are brighter and more concentrated (so even a few drops of gel food coloring bring out a great bright color).
- The cookie dough needs to be chilled at least 45 minutes to 1 hour, as it's a very soft cookie dough. You can even store it in the fridge up to 3-4 days. To reduce too much spreading of the cookies use a silicone baking mat. You can use parchment paper too.
- You can use skittles or m&m's for the monster eyes, and draw on the eyeballs with a black edible marker pen. You can even use candy eyes, but I wasn't able to find them and in any case I wanted these monster cookies to be as colorful as possible, so I like the colored eyes. While the cookies are baking, you can draw on the eyes on the candy and then as soon as the cookies are out of the oven, press the cookies in so that they stick to the cookies. I don't recommend putting on the candy eyes before baking, because then the candies will melt.
- I used the same black edible marker to draw on the monster smiles, but if you want, you can even pipe them on with icing. However, I think the black edible marker is SO easy to use, that even a kid can draw on the smiles. These are not the exact ones I used, but here's the link to similar Edible Markers.
- And one final tip, remember to not over bake these cookies. Cake mix cookies go from almost baked to really over baked quite fast. So take them out of the oven when the edges are firm but the middle is still soft. The cookies will continue cooking from the residual heat of the baking tray.
More Cake Mix Cookies:
Chewy Strawberry Cake Mix Cookies
These scary treats are SO fun to make, and I do hope you try them out especially if you have little kids at home who like to bake. And the very last tip I want to give before I leave, have fun with these cookies. They don't have to be perfect. They'll look great anyway you make them! 🙂
Enjoy!!
Six-Ingredient Cake Mix Halloween Monster Cookies
These Six-Ingredient Cake Mix Halloween Monster Cookies are the perfect 'scary' treat to bake with your kids. These Halloween cookies do not require special ingredients or difficult decorating techniques so anyone can make them. And you can customize them with different colors and candy!
- 1 box white cake mix (dry ingredients only)
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 2 large eggs
- Green gel food colouring ((I used Wilton Leaf Green))
- Red gel food colouring ((I used a mix of Wilton Rose and Wilton Christmas Red gel colors))
- 1 edible marker pen (black)
- Skittles or m&m’s (for the monster eyes)
In a bowl mix together the white cake mix, oil and eggs until combined. Divide the batter equally into two separate bowls.
- Add gel food colouring to get the desired colour you want (I used green and red gel food colouring - also see notes).
- Place in the fridge for about 45 minutes.
- Meanwhile, using your edible marker pen, draw ‘eyes’ on the skittles or m&m’s. I used different colours for fun. Set aside.
- Once ready to bake the cookies, line a baking tray with a silicone mat or baking parchment.
Scoop out the cookie dough and bake at 350 F / 175 C for 10-12 minutes. The cookies are ready to be taken out of the oven when the edges are slightly firm but the middle is still soft and squishy (also see notes).
- As soon as you take them out of the oven, press in the ‘eyes’.
- Once the cookies have cooled you can draw scary or silly faces on the cookies with the edible marker pen.
- These cookies can be stored unto 4-5 days in an airtight container.
How many cookies can you make with one box?
Hi Bonnie...about 16 cookies.
What temperature are you supposed to bake these cookies at?
350 f / 175 c.
Super cute! My daughter is making these for a friends' halloween party! Perfect for a group of teen girls. 🙂
Oh that sounds super fun! I hope they had a good time making the cookies 🙂
These look great! I'll have to try them out this Halloween, thank you for sharing.
Wajeeha, these are so cute! And PERFECT for halloween. They sound delicious too 🙂
Thank you Bethany! 🙂
Oh my gosh these monster cookies are so adorable. I love this cute idea. Can't wait to make the for Halloween.
Thanks Heidy, I do hope you enjoy making these cookies! 🙂
These cookies are absolutely adorable! My kids would totally love for Halloween!
Thanks Kelly! 🙂
Wow! These cookies look beautiful and those colors! Perfect Halloween treat 🙂
Thank you Julia!
wow these are so nice and bright the grand kids will surely flip over these monster cookies they really are some great effects with color!
Aww, I hope they like them! Thanks! 🙂
These are so adorable!! Perfect for a class Halloween party!!!
Thanks Tisha! Yes they'd be great for a Halloween party! 🙂
These are adorable. You must have had so much fun thinking up the'look'. Thanks for the very fun and colorful reipe.
Yes they actually were fun to make! Thank you! 🙂
I can't believe how bright thisrecipe is! And easy, too. I don't remember when was the last time I smiled reading through a recipe and looking at recipe images. Great job!
Thank you so much Elaine...that's really sweet of you! 🙂
what a fun halloween cookie!! Love it!! Love the crazy skittles eyes!!
Thanks Camila, I think the skittles eyes are my favorite too! 🙂
Oh my, these cookies are too cute! I love the bright colors!
Thank you Jessica! 🙂
After all you went through, I must say they turned out super adorable! And I can definitely relate! I think my girls would love making these together and maybe we can even have them for our Halloween party! 🙂
Thanks a ton Sherri. I'm sure your girls would love making these...my daughter is still talking about these monster cookies! Hehe 🙂
How do you make this with out using the box cake mix