Lunchbox Cashew Cookies is a recipe I’ve had since Fuzz was in first grade! Thanks to Stephanie, for sending it. I really do need to update the photo because these are good cookies and a fun way to use roasted, salted cashew pieces.
Lunchbox Cashew Cookie Notes
The original version of this recipe, which came from one of Stephanie’s church cookbooks, included a recipe for Brown Butter Frosting. I tried the frosting but thought it made the cookies a little too rich. This is totally subject. Maybe I was in a weirder than usual mood. If you think you’ll like the frosting, you should try it. It sets up firm, so you can still pack the cookies in a lunchbox without frosting smearing everywhere. If you don’t want to bother with the frosting, a handful of butterscotch morsels works nicely.
Crunchy Cookies
As mentioned, these cookies are on the softer side. If you’re in the mood for a crunchier sweet & salty cookie, try this recipe or this oatmeal cashew cookie recipe.
Lunchbox Cashew Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 stick unsalted butter room temperature (114 grams – 4 oz)
- 1 cup light brown sugar 180 grams
- 1 large egg
- 3/4 tsp. vanilla
- 1/3 cup sour cream 80 grams
- 2 cups flour 255 grams
- 3/4 tsp. baking powder
- 3/4 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 3/4 to 2 cups lightly salted cashew halves & pieces2/3 cup butterscotch chips use only if not frosting
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- Cream butter and brown sugar with an electric mixer; beat in egg and vanilla. Fold in the sour cream, keeping the batter light.
- Thoroughly mix flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together in a separate bowl. Add flour mixture to butter mixture and stir until almost mixed. Add cashews and butterscotch chips and stir until fully mixed.
- Drop dough by well-rounded teaspoonfuls onto cookie sheet. Bake for 12-14 minutes or until edges are brown. Cool and frost with brown butter frosting if desired.
lynn
Anna, I am loving your website/blog. Cashews and butterscotch, oh yummers! I don’t have any kidlets to pack lunches for, but I do send my cookie “experiments” to work with my husband. They are truckers and absolute “cookie hounds”. His buddies have jokingly threatened to stuff him in his locker if he stops the cookies. Please keep the terrific recipes coming! 🙂
Karen
Thanks so much Anna. I will try them.
ling
Thanks Anna! I’m not a fan of cakey… so I’m glad to hear that these aren’t. Yay! Going to make them this week!
Anna
Hi Karen,
This recipe, adapted from allrecipes.com, is pretty reliable when it comes to fat cookies. Make sure you chill the dough — the longer the better. Also, I have found that bleached flour makes fatter cookies.
Best Big, Fat, Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 egg
1 egg yolk
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Sift together the flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.
Beat the melted butter, brown sugar and white sugar until well blended. Beat in the vanilla, egg and egg yolk until light and creamy. Mix in the sifted ingredients until just blended. Stir in the chocolate chips. Chill dough for at least 3 hours (longer the better) Drop cookie dough 1/4 cup at a time onto the prepared cookie sheets. .
Bake for 15 to 17 minutes
Karen
Anna I need your help again. You were so gracious to help me with my son’s cookie cake for his birthday(which got rave reviews. I would like your advice on your favorite fat chocolate chip cookie that is not cakey, a little chewy in the middle. I like the Leavlin copy cat but not sure if it is the best version or if you have a “better” suggestion for what I am looking for.
Thanks!
Karen
Haley
She will be so surprised when she opens her lunchbox and finds these delicious cookies! What a treat!
We’d like to invite you to participate in our September apple and peach recipe contest (the recipe can be sweet or savory). All competitors will be eligible to win one of three prizes :)! Please email me, [email protected], if you’re interested. Feel free to check out our blog for more details: http://blog.keyingredient.com/2008/08/29/september-kick-contest/
Thanks :),
Haley
KI Blogger
Katrina
Sue,
I have a baking basics cook book that was probably my first cook book as a teenager, but it lists a bunch of things you can substitute things for in a pinch and it says you can use either 1 T. lemon juice OR 1 T. vinegar with 1 cup milk to sour it for buttermilk replacement. I’ve used both many times over the years and think they both work great.
Anna
Hi Ling,
That’s a good question because you’d think with the sour cream and baking powder, the cookies would be cakey. Luckily, they weren’t. They were definitely tender, but they were really dense as opposed to light and soft. The ones I took straight from the oven had crispy brown edges and they were excellent that way! I let the rest cool and put them in a zipper bag. After a few hours closed up in the bag, those cookies did get softer, *but* they were still really good. The cashews (and I used a lot of them!) were a good contrast to the tender cookie.
So in short, I wouldn’t say they were cakey.
ling
Hi Anna,
I love cashews, so these cookies are calling out to me. Just wondering… are these cakey at all (from the sour cream)?
Hope Fuzz enjoyed her packed lunch : )
clumbsycookie
Yep, they were like picnik baskets. It wasn’t only me, it’s a country thing, lol…
Deanna
My boys have been on a cashew kick. If I can hide some I am going to have to surprise them with these!
Sue
No worries Anna! They were given great reviews, and I would definitely make them again, just the same way because of the feedback I got. I just wondered if there was much if any difference between mine with the sour milk and yours with the buttermilk.
Anna
Joanna, I had to beg my mom to pack lunch too. Every once in a while she’d do it, but usually I bought lunch. My favorite lunch was pizza, and on a REALLY great day, it would be served with a popsicle.
Katrina, it sounds like maybe your kids are really sensitive to textures. Maybe a lot of the foods they don’t like are just textures they can’t deal with. I’m glad they ;like cashews, though!
Debbi, somewhere on this blog I have a protein packed peanut butter chocolate chip cookie. I’ll have to hunt it down for you.
Veggiegirl, you are lucky to have such a great relationship with your parents. They seem so sweet in the pictures you’ve posted.
Sue, I’d have to go back and make them again to be sure. But sour milk is usually a good substitute for buttermilk in terms of adding an acid. You probably did everything right.
Heart of Glass, I can’t wait to hear your review. Also, see above. Pizza was my favorite school lunch day too. I hated hot dogs, though.
Rita, really? You took your lunch to school in baskets? I guess they looked like picnik baskets, right?
clumbsycookie
There’s something special about packed lunches! It’s like having a picnic everyday! I would have loved to find those cookies in my basket (no bags here, we had basquets)! I love cashwes!
HeartofGlass
Cashews! Ooh, this recipe is like a gift–they are my absolute favorite! I am a cashew butter a-holic, too!
I admit that my favorite days in elementary school were the pizza, McDonald’s, and hot dog days, followed by ice cream sandwiches. My mother’s specialty was still-frozen tuna or pb and jelly on seeded rye bread and an apple, which got promptly thrown out. Your daughter is so lucky to have a great cook making her meals, and she sounds like a very healthy eater!
RE: Sue (Anna will answer this) but I always thought vinegar rather than lemon juice in milk was a substitute for buttermilk (I never have, I just usually buy the buttermilk though).
Sue
Fuzz is fortunate to have you to pack tasty lunches for her. You’re fortunate to have a kid who will eat nuts! Mine wouldn’t touch them, even in a cookie!
On a different note. I made the small batch cupcakes that you posted about a few years ago. They were perfect for the occasion and the recipients said they were very tasty. I substituted milk mixed with lemon juice for the buttermilk. My cupcakes didn’t rise a lot, but appeared to have a very nice texture. Do you remember if yours rose much? Usually soured milk is an acceptable substitute for buttermilk, but maybe not this time?
Maria
Love the looks of this one. They look so chunky and delicious!
Stephanie
What a great idea to put the butterscotch chips in instead of the frosting. Can’t wait to try them that way!
VeggieGirl
I always brought lunch from home – my mom packed the best lunches and “Have a nice day” notes in my lunch bag 🙂
Good luck to Fuzz in school – today was MY first day back!!
Debbi
Today is the first day of school for my kids and I am again packing lunches for my oh-so-picky eaters. I like to send along a nice protein packed cookie with one of my sons sometimes because he NEVER eats protein otherwise. This is a nice option, thanks! He loves butterscotch and cashews. (who doesn’t!)
Heather D
These sound great. And I love brown butter frosting (reminds me of Grandma) I’m excited about this as my husband gets a large tin of cashews every year from one of his vendors & I never know what to do with so many.
Katrina
Those look really good. I love cashews and my son, who says he hates nuts, does like the “soft nuts”, which I’m not sure why he calls them that, but whenever I ask and show him a cashew, he says that’s the ones he likes. Being as he is the world’s pickiest eater right now, these sound great as a way to sneak a little protein in him.
Joanna
School lunches never appealed to me that much. I would beg my mom to pack mine. These cookies sound so delicious! I love cashews-they are so sweet and go perfect with butterscotch.