Valentine’s Day Cookie Cups

Valentine’s Day Cookie Cups are simple, semi-homemade sweet treats with a hidden candy hug tucked inside each cookie. This easy-to-make recipe quickly combines a sugar cookie mix with 4 basic ingredients to form the dough that covers the chocolate and bakes it into the best bite-sized delicious dessert that’s sealed with a kiss.

Shortcut Valentine’s Day Cookie Cups With A Sweet Surprise

Skip the store-bought box of chocolates because baking these homemade Valentine’s Day Cookie Cups is the easiest and sweetest way to win that special someone’s heart, especially since my recipe has a shortcut solution to send your heartfelt wish when you’re at a loss for words. (Inspired by my good friend, Spaceships and Laserbeams Grinch Cookie Cups!)

I love using a package of sugar cookie mix to simplify the ingredient list; it takes mere minutes to combine with a few other pantry staples to form a perfectly pink, soft, chewy, buttery base for the cookie cups. The dough is wrapped around the Hershey’s hug and hides the chocolate until it’s baked and revealed upon the first bite.

The best part is that these cups are cooked in muffin tins, so they won’t spread like the traditional treats–each cookie is guaranteed to be thick enough to handle the Hersey’s.

Homemade presents are the sweetest (and tastiest) tokens of affection and perfect to share with the people that matter the most. These Valentine’s Day Cookie Cups are delicious desserts with the prettiest combination of sprinkles, chocolate, and pink colors that send a sweet message and spreads the language of love.

Ingredients

• Packaged sugar cookie mix: Feel free to use a homemade sugar cookie dough for this recipe, but make sure to add the food coloring into it with the liquids. You can also use a snickerdoodle cookie mix, but leave out the cinnamon sugar packet.
• Salted butter: You can switch this out for unsalted butter, and add an extra pinch of salt in to keep the flavor. 
• All-purpose flour
• Egg
• Pink/red food coloring: For a fancier type of food coloring with a little flavor, juice some strawberries or raspberries and use them for your food coloring.
• Hershey’s hugs (unwrapped): You can use any type of Hershey’s kiss for this recipe.
• Decorative sprinkles (optional topping)

Recommended Tools to Make this Recipe

• Mini cupcake pan
• Cooking spray
• Hand or stand mixer
• Measuring tools
• Mixing bowls (large and small)
• Mixing tools

How to Make Valentine’s Day Cookie Cups

This Valentine’s Day Cookie Cups recipe is so simple with a semi-homemade solution for easy, fuss-free baking. The sugar cookie base is thick enough to hide a sweet surprise wrapped inside–it’s the prettiest pink, bite-sized treat that’s better than buying a box of chocolate because it’s made from the heart.

1. Beat the sugar cookie mix, melted butter, flour, egg, and food coloring together until just combined.
   Pro Tip: Adjust food coloring amounts as needed or desired color is attained.
2. Scoop about 1 Tablespoon of cookie dough and flatten it to the size of your palm.
   Pro Tip: You can use your hand or a rolling pin to flatten the dough.
3. Place a Hershey’s hug in the center of the flattened cookie dough and then wrap the dough around the Hershey’s hug to create a ball. 
   Pro-Tip: As you wrap the dough around the Hershey’s hugs, you will need to fix the cracks will form in the dough. They won’t just fold perfectly. Use your hands to form the ball of dough around the hug.
4. Add the chocolate-filled cookie dough ball into a muffin pan cavity upright and repeat until all the cookie dough is used.
5. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 10-12 minutes or until the outsides of the dough looks set.
6. Remove from the oven and top with decorative sprinkles. 
   Pro-Tip: Find some cute decorative sprinkles, like flowers or hearts, to decorate the tops of the cups. Press them into the warm dough slightly as soon as they come out of the oven in order to get them to stay better.
7. Cool, serve, and enjoy!
   Pro-Tip: It’s best to allow the cookie cups to cool for about 15 minutes before removing them from the muffin tins. If they are too hot, they will fall apart.

Storage Tips

• To Store: You can store these cookie cups in an airtight container at room temperature. They will keep for up to two weeks.
• To Freeze: To freeze your cookie cups, wrap them individually, place them in a freezer-safe container or bag, and store them in the freezer for 5-6 months. 

Other Easy Valentines Day Dessert Recipes

• Instant Pot Hot Chocolate Bombs (Valentine’s Day Edition)
• Valentine’s Heart Cake {Surprise Inside}
• Valentine’s Rice Krispie Treats Hearts
• Valentine’s Day Snack Mix (Sugar Cookie Popcorn)
• Valentine’s Day Bark
• Valentine Hearts Fudge