Giant Slow-Cooker Cookies Are The Decadent Dessert You Need To Try

The crockpot is a kitchen staple that continues to prove its worth in our homes, saving us time, effort, and many nearly-forgotten dinners. You just throw in your ingredients, and when you're ready for dinner, your meal sits there patiently waiting for you.

The slow, low heat of a crockpot is a fantastic cooking method for so many dishes, producing perfectly tender food without fail. Slow-cooked meats like chicken, beef, or pork shoulder, which you can cook as a one-and-done meal or shred up for things like tacos and pulled pork sandwiches. Soups, stews, and chilis that simmer all day, soaking in their many flavors. Party foods like warm dips and hearty casseroles. We're no strangers to these minimal-prep, easy-to-make meals that beg to be cooked in a crockpot.

But a slow-cooker cookie? This you might be a stranger to. You may have never thought to make dessert in your slow cooker before, let alone a giant crockpot-sized cookie.

You might be wondering what this even entails, and what a giant slow-cooker cookie is like. Is it gooey or fluffy like a cake? What kind of dough do you use? How do you even go about eating it? 

The first step is to make your cookie dough. A simple chocolate chip recipe works great, but feel free to add other mix-ins. Food52 adds an extra egg yolk to their recipe for a bit more moisture since the cookie will obviously be so thick. You'll want to grease up your slow cooker and line it with parchment paper so it's easy to remove (a tip is to cut two pieces and crisscross them). Then just press the batter into your crockpot in one layer. From there, it's pretty much a choose-your-own-adventure based on what kind of cookie you want.

For a cookie that's cooked through and slightly cake-like with a gooey center, Food52 recommends cooking the giant slab of dough for around 1 to 1.5 hours on high, or 3.5 to 4 hours on low. If you prefer a firmer or crispier cookie that you can cut up into bars or slices, cook it another 15-30 minutes on high until its edges get nice and golden. You may need to play around with the timing depending on what size your crockpot is.

Although you might not think to whip out the slow cooker in place of the tried-and-true oven (especially when it comes to baked goods), you can use your crockpot to make so many kinds of easy, no-mess, bake-ahead desserts.

If slow-cooker cookies are a thing, you better believe slow-cooker brownies are too. In a similar method, you just pour your brownie batter in and bake it in one go for a giant gooey, fudgy brownie that you can dig into or cut up. For something a little different, try making crockpot rice pudding, which is an even easier dessert that doesn't require any prep before you plop in the ingredients. Use your crockpot to make hot chocolate (and keep it hot) on a cold day, or even to make apple butter. Your slow cooker is full of surprises, so go see what it can do.