Best Cake Mix Cookie Bars Recipe - Build Your Bite (2024)

FAQs

How do you pimp up cake mix? ›

Add Milk, Coffee, or Soda

Take things one step further and pair your cake mix with a flavored liquid. For example, buttermilk sings in a yellow and red velvet cake and brewed coffee makes chocolate cake taste bolder. Also, pop open a can of soda—Sprite, 7 Up, or ginger beer—for lemon and strawberry cake mixes.

Enrich with fat.

Mix in room-temperature cream cheese, ricotta, sour cream, whole-fat yogurt, or peanut butter in addition to the fat called for on the box to yield even richer cakes.

The mum-of-three mixes a can of fruit (typically $1-$2) with a 90c vanilla cake mix from Coles or Woolworths and simply distributes the mixture in her muffin tin. She does not use anything extra - including milk, eggs, or butter.

More Fat, More Flavor

Most box cake recipes call for vegetable or canola oil. The only trouble is, these oils have almost no flavor. Replace the oil with an equal amount of melted butter (and a pinch of salt if using unsalted butter), to boost richness. For an extra decadent cake, add two tablespoons of mayonnaise.

For vanilla or yellow cake mixes, try adding diced crystallized ginger, dried fruit, or fresh berries. For chocolate or vanilla cake mixes, try adding unsweetened shredded coconut, toasted chopped nuts, or chocolate chips.

Add one to two teaspoons of a pure extract to make it taste like a from-scratch cake. Pure vanilla extract and pure almond extract are great options, but you could also try lemon extract or orange extract paired with fresh citrus zest.

For chemically-leavened cakes — that is, cakes calling for baking powder or baking soda — it's OK if you don't remember to add the eggs until the end. Martina says, “Late in the mixing stage, eggs will incorporate better if you lightly beat them before adding to the batter.

Boxed cake mixes tend to be lighter in consistency, but if you're craving that thicker, moister, denser cake, then all you have to do is add an extra egg to your mix. The additional fat in the egg yolk helps create a more tender and moist cake that is full of flavor.

To get an extra rich and moist cake, stir in two extra egg yolks along with the eggs the recipe calls for. Add sugar and flour to the dry mix. Add 1/4- 1 cup sugar and flour to your cake mix. Use coffee instead of water for chocolate cakes.

Pure vanilla extract and pure almond extract are great options, but you could also try lemon extract or orange extract paired with fresh citrus zest. Although more expensive, vanilla bean paste or fresh vanilla beans will provide even richer flavor to a boxed mix.

How do you make store bought cake mix better? ›

Add a leavening agent to the flour. Most cakes will call for a leavening agent like baking powder or baking soda. These create the bubbles you need for the cake to rise.