Pumpkin/Chai/Kiss Cookies, and Crescents Too

These are a little late in getting shared online. Pinterest is working fine for me now. 

I wanted to make cookies the other weekend. And I wanted to make very specific cookies. But Pinterest was really fighting with me and even though I had the picture of the cookies I wanted to make, I couldn't get to the recipe. Google turned up a few alternatives, but not quite what I was hoping to make.

So, I thought I'd make my own version of what I wanted by making a few changes to a recipe I already know I like.

A box of cake mix, some powdered chair mix, a can of pumpkin, and some Hershey Pumpkin Spice Kisses.

All things I happened to have in my pantry. Although, I had to hide the Hershey Kisses from myself to ensure I had them in the pantry when I got around to making cookies.

I added some chai mix to the cake mix. And by some, I mean two heaping containers of the little scoop inside the can. I'd guess that was something like 5 tablespoons.

Once the dry cake mix smelled sufficiently like chai - to the point I began to wonder if I would be able to convince my test subjects guests to try the cookies - I added the can of pumpkin. And just like last time I used this brand of canned pumpkin, it immediately seemed too moist (I generally use Libby's and have much better success with that brand, I'm not sure why). Still, I followed the directions and baked the cookies as usual.

Upon pulling the warm cookies from the oven, I topped each one with a Hershey's Kiss.

And tried to wait for them to be cool enough to eat.

The instructions said not to touch them after adding the Kisses. Directions about what not to do usually make me curious. In my case, they just kind of collapsed a little.

They don't look quite as good collapsed, but I found them easier to eat that way. 

My cookies turned out nowhere near as cute as the ones I wanted to make. I'm guessing they didn't taste nearly as good either. All of us ate one, and collectively agreed we'd rather have the usual pumpkin/chocolate chip - so I dumped some chocolate chips into the dough and went back to eating the Hershey Kisses plain. Which really, was a win-win. 

It also means I had some Kisses leftover the next morning when I was making breakfast. 

I'd hoped for doughnuts, but when time ran short, I pulled out my favorite crescent rolls, the jar of crunchy peanut butter, Nutella, and those extra Kisses. Eight crescents turned into 2 plain, 4 peanut butter/Nutella, and 2 Pumpkin Spice filled. All of which were better than the cookies from the night before. And yes, the peanut butter/Nutella crescents were another Pinterest idea. The Hershey Kiss crescents only happened because I was tired of spooning out Nutella, and they happened to be sitting right there. The plain ones? Those were in case the other experiments turned out terrible and we needed something to chew on while I scrambled for another breakfast idea. 

I'm relieved Pinterest started working for me again - because as interesting as it was to use only a photo for baking inspiration, I think having the right recipe is a little better for me.