Dessert

Cookies & Cream Hot Pudding Cake

Chocolate cookie cake with a warm vanilla pudding layer underneath.

Prep 5 min HIGH 2–2½ hours Serves 8

Cookies & Cream Hot Pudding Cake, finished and plated — Serving suggestion

This is the one kids campaign for. Cookies and cream is a flavor built entirely for pleasure, and putting it in a warm pudding cake is close to unfair.

The structure is the same as the molten cakes — batter, hot water, no stirring — but with instant vanilla pudding powder in the mix. That's what makes the bottom layer creamy rather than fudgy, and it's why this is a pudding cake rather than a lava cake.

Crushed chocolate sandwich cookies go in the packet and more go on top at the end. There is no version of this that is too much.

Why you'll love it

Kids campaign for this one.

Cookies and cream needs no explanation to anybody under twelve.

Pudding layer, not fudge.

Vanilla pudding powder makes the bottom creamy rather than dense.

Five ingredients.

Packet, milk, butter, water, and cookies if you want more.

Two hours.

One of the fastest desserts here.

What's already in the packet

Granulated sugarAll-purpose flourBrown sugar powderInstant vanilla pudding powderDark cocoa powderCornstarchCrushed chocolate sandwich cookiesBaking powderFine sea saltVanilla powder

Instant vanilla pudding powder is what makes the bottom layer creamy, with cocoa and real cookie pieces on top of it.

Choose your setting

This one cooks on HIGH

HIGH · 2–2½ hours

Desserts cook on HIGH. Put a paper towel under the lid to catch condensation.

Done when

Top is set; pudding layer underneath is still loose. That's correct.

You'll Need

1 packet Cook SLO Cookies & Cream Hot Pudding Cake
¾ cup Whole milk
½ cup Butter, melted
1¼ cups Hot water

What you add

¾ cup

Whole milk

½ cup

Melted butter

1¼ cups

Hot water

Desserts cook on HIGH. Paper towel under the lid

Toppings & mix-ins

Vanilla ice creamWhipped creamExtra crushed cookiesChocolate syrupChocolate chipsCookie butter

Crush a few extra cookies over the top right before serving. Crunch against the soft pudding is the whole appeal.

Before anything goes in the pot

1
Whisk the batter in a bowl, not in the crock
Lumps mixed in the pot stay lumps. A bowl and a whisk take one minute and the difference is visible in the finished cake.

These happen outside the crock pot, before it's switched on.

Tonight's Plan

1
Grease the crock pot or drop in a liner.
It sticks.
2
Whisk the packet, milk and melted butter together until smooth.
In a bowl. No eggs in this one.
3
Pour the batter into the crock pot and spread it flat.
Even layer.
4
Pour the hot water gently over the top and do not stir.
The pudding layer forms underneath. Stirring destroys it.

Right before you serve

Finishing touches

Turn it off and let it stand 15 minutes with the lid off.

The top sets as it rests.

Spoon from the pot, scooping pudding from the bottom over each serving.

The pudding is the point. Get down to it.

Stirring

Do not stir once the lid is on

Cakes, cobblers and puddings set in layers. Stirring collapses the separation between the cake and the sauce underneath, and you end up with one uniform wet layer instead of two good ones.

Swaps and add-ins

Add more crushed cookies.

A cup, folded into the batter. There is no upper limit here.

Add white chocolate chips.

Half a cup over the batter.

Make it mint.

A quarter teaspoon of peppermint extract in the batter.

Add cookie butter.

Three tablespoons dolloped on the batter before the water.

Tips for success

Do not stir after the water. Every pudding cake in this book lives or dies on this instruction.
No eggs in this one. It's the only cake here without them, which makes it the easiest to throw together.
Extra cookies on top at the end. Crushed after cooking, so they stay crunchy.
Drop in a liner before anything else. Smooth it against the sides and fold the edges over the rim. When you're done, lift it out and throw it away — the crock never needs scrubbing.

Finish it right

Extra crushed cookies, added after cooking.

Cookies baked in go soft. Cookies added at the end stay crunchy, and that texture is the whole appeal.

Vanilla ice cream.

Cookies and cream on cookies and cream. Nobody has objected yet.

A drizzle of chocolate syrup.

Purely indulgent and entirely appropriate.

Serve it over

Warm in bowls with vanilla ice creamWith whipped cream and crushed cookiesDrizzled with chocolate syrup

Tomorrow night

Warm it up.

Twenty seconds and the pudding layer comes back.

Cookies and cream milkshake.

Blended with vanilla ice cream and milk.

Trifle.

Layered in a glass with whipped cream and more cookies.

Cold, like a dense brownie.

It sets firm and it's very good with coffee.

Keeping it

Fridge

Covered, up to 3 days

Freezer

Not recommended — the pudding layer separates.

Reheating

Twenty seconds in the microwave.

Questions people ask

Recipe card