Cereal is great, but have you ever baked with it? These Cap’n Crunch Cookies are made with Cap’n Crunch cereal and browned butter and will have you hooked!
I took a page from Christina Tosi’s ‘ole book of tricks and combined two of most everyone’s favorite things; cookies and cereal. And for the record, this ain’t my first time, nor will it be my last. Last summer, I made Cornflake Chocolate Chip Marshmallow Cookies from the Momofuku Milk Bar cookbook and they were pretty scrumptious, but I think I found an even better cookie-cereal combo using Cap’n Crunch.
Let’s Talk Ingredients for Cap’n Crunch Cookies
- Cap’n Crunch Cereal is a corn based sugary cereal and it’s super crunchy! The number one question I get asked about this Cap’n Crunch cookie recipe is, “will this cut up my mouth as bad as when I eat the cereal?” And the answer is no, it certainly won’t! That’s because we pulverize those crunchy nuggets of corny goodness into a fine powder. All the flavour, no wounded mouth.
- Cake Flour: Using cake flour will help create a more tender and soft cookie than using all-purpose flour. I found that using the pulverized cereal created a very hard, crunchy cookie otherwise. Cake flour helped to keep things softer.
- Brown Butter: Browning your butter adds an incredible toastiness to these cookies and amplifies the caramel flavour of the cereal. Chances are you’ve already experienced how glorious browned butter is, and I probably don’t need to convince you to make it solely for the purpose of making cookies.
Tips for Making Cap’n Crunch Cookies
- Use a food processor to pulverize the Cap’n Crunch cereal. It’s the best way to get a super fine powder.
- Brown the butter carefully. It can be easy to burn the milk solids, so don’t walk away while making it. Stay close and watch closely. Once the butter has browned, immediately remove it from the hot pan so it stops cooking.
- Under-bake the cookies. You probably hear this all the time, but under-baking cookies is the key to a great, chewy centre.
- Store in an air-tight container or they could dry out. These golden beauties have crispy edges and a nice, firm, chewy center. I find that after sitting overnight, they get just a smidge crunchier, but still slightly chewy at the same time. I found it to be a great combination of crispy, crunchy and chewy – perfect for dunking in cold milk!
- Feel free to eat a few for breakfast, since that’s what the Quaker Oats Company originally intended it for!
Love Cookies? Check out these recipes:
- Brownie Cookies with Peanut Butter Frosting
- Banana Bread Cookies with Walnuts and Chocolate Chips
- Peppermint Mocha Cookies
- 4 Ingredient Shortbread Cookies
Cap’n Crunch Cookies
Crispy cookies made with Cap'n Crunch cereal!
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Servings: 24 Cookies (depending on size)
Ingredients
- 3 cups Cap'n Crunch cereal divided
- 1 cup unsalted butter
- 3/4 cup brown sugar lightly packed
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 egg + 1 egg yolk
- 3/4 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 1/2 cups cake flour
Instructions
For the Brown Butter
- Add butter to skillet over medium heat. Once butter has melted, whisk constantly. The butter will bubble and foam up slightly and then subside. This is when the browning will occur.
- Watch for little brown flecks in the bottom of the pan. It should also smell nutty. Watch carefully as the butter browns, because it can burn quickly. Once the foamy has subsided and you see lots of little brown flecks, the butter has been browned.
- Remove from heat and transfer to a bowl to stop the cooking process. Allow butter to come to room temperature. It doesn't need to be solid.
For the cookies
- Line two baking sheets with parchment and set aside.
- Preheat oven to 350°F
- In a food processor (or plastic bag, smash with a rolling pin) pulse 2 cups of the Cap'n Crunch cereal until finely ground. Set aside in a bowl.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment, beat together browned butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar until fluffy and pale in color.
- Beat in vanilla, whole egg and egg yolk and continue beating until light and fluffy.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together baking soda, salt, flour and finely ground Cap'n Crunch cereal.
- Reduce mixer speed to low and beat in the flour mixture until just combined.
For rolling the cookies:
- In a food processor (or plastic bag, smash with a rolling pin) pulse remaining 1 cup of Cap'n Crunch cereal until finely ground.
- Portion dough into 2-3 Tbsp sized balls, then roll the cookie dough in the ground cereal and coat evenly. You can also add coarse pieces of cereal to the tops of each cookie, too.
- Bake for 8-9 minutes. Aim to have them slightly under baked if you want them to still be slightly soft once baked.
- Cool for 2-3 minutes on the baking sheet, then transfer to a rack to completely cool.
Nutritional calculation was provided by WP Recipe Maker and is an estimation only. For special diets or medical issues please use your preferred calculator
Did you make this recipe?Mention @culinarycool or tag #culinarycool!
Recipe adapted from Bourbonnatrix
very creative! they have a unique taste and i think it’d be perfect in a cookie.
Thanks! They most certainly do make a perfect cookie, in my opinion 🙂
Making them right now!
🙂
Glad you enjoyed them!
I made them today, they were a big hit! I didn’t have cake flour but all-purpose was fine. Thank you!
Im so happy to hear they were a hit!
Why cake flour vs all purpose flour?
Hi Allison, cake flour in this recipe helps keep the cookies really soft and tender. You can definitely still just use all-purpose. Cake flour just has lower protein, which leaves baked goods (such as cakes) nice and tender.
My granddaughter made Tosi’s Corn Flake cookies, and I immediately thought, wow love to try these with Capn Crunch. Obviously I was not alone! I used the Tosi recipe substituting the cereals. Her recipe calls for making a “crumble”. The result was delicious. Now I will need to make your version to compare. Did you try the Tosi recipe, or did you want to make it your own?
Hi Michael, I’ve made her Corn Flake cookies before and loved them! That’s where I got the inspiration for these!
Followed the recipe exactly and they came out wonderful!
Hi Lulu. I’m thrilled to hear you enjoyed the cookies!
Well, I cannot tell you adequately how much we LOVED these cookies. My favorite cereal as a kid and as an adult, did not so much because it is so rough on the mouth. Now I can get the great flavor in a delicious cookie, so now I can eat them with milk or a cup of coffee!
This sounds like a perfect cookie to pair with my coffee or tea.
I can’t wait to make this at home.
Loving already this cookie treat! Looks absolutely delicious! An instant favorite especially among kids! Great texture too, making this so enticing and tempting!
How fun are these cookies? And they have such a great flavor and texture. They turned out so good.
Baking with cereal is so fun. My kids love when I make cookies with their favorite cereal, and this was not the exception to the rule. They ate every single one of them.
These cookies turned out delicious. My kids love this cereal so it was a double treat for them, and probably many other kids!
What a fun and unique treat! My daughter will love these cookies. I’ll be making this week.
i can’t wait to try these but not sure where to find cake flour. Is this the same as all purpose flour?
Hi Maddy, Cake flour is a finely milled flour with a lower protein content than AP. Making your own cake flour substitute is easy. Just take out two Tablespoons of flour from one cup of all purpose flour and add in two tablespoons of cornstarch to get one cup of cake flour.
Captain Crunch was one of my favorite cereals growing up so I’m looking forward to trying these cookies.
What a fun concept for a cookie! Cap’n Crunch was such a special cereal in my childhood. We actually only got to have it for Christmas morning and Easter morning so it has so many fond memories attached to it! I HAVE to try these cookies!