Easy Bake Letdown

Going into the holiday season, the Easy Bake Oven was a popular commercial.  Very popular.  Between every cartoon.  Every single day.  Well this little boy bought into the Easy Bake Oven, hook, line and sinker just as we all have for decades.  I mean, whats better than your own personal oven? 

 

When I was little, I too had an Easy Bake oven and it was great!  I remember making little cakes and they were good!  Over the years I think that they had to tighten up the design of the oven a bit too much.  It just isn't the same anymore, too small of an opening to get anything good in there and it doesn't get hot enough.  We didn't realize it until it was too late.

 

Quinn, the lucky boy, got his wish for his birthday and couldn't wait to make some cookies.  He loves to bake, and mix and taste.  He took everything out of the box and waited for my instruction.

 

 

He couldn't stop touching each piece in anticipation.  He was just..SO..EXCITED!!!! 

 

I took out the little packet that came with the oven to help Quinn make the chocolate chip cookies.  Right away I was a little concerned...the entire packet of dry ingredients required only 1 teaspoon of water.  Total.  Really?  We mixed it up and it looked like this.  Mmmm, yummy...maybe?

  

 

Then it was time to form the cookies and place them on the teeny tiny cookie sheet, literally about the size of a playing card.  Quinn couldn't help with this step at all because the cookies were so gooey, it was kind of like trying to form oatmeal into little balls. 

 

 

Now this cookie sheet is unusually small, even for a 4 year old. 

You can see the comparison below.

This is the picture on the front of the box.  A little misleading wouldn't you say? You can hardly tell by the picture that the cookies on the plate are each the size of a fingernail.

 

 

Ready to Bake!!!

 

Wait...maybe not...I  tried to put the tiny pan into the oven to bake the cookies. The miniature balls were too big to fit. What??? I had to then smash them as flat as a penny so that they would fit through the oven slot. Hmmm. It was getting even more ridiculous than I thought. Quinn didn't seem to mind though.

 

The package said to bake them for like 4 minutes or something...I can't quite remember.  What I do rememeber though is that I had to triple the bake time and even then...they didn't seem quite done.

 

The result: A dozen chocolate chip cookies fit on a small cake plate. Quinn and I each ate one and threw the rest away.  Now Quinn is anxious to make a pizza..I wonder how that can possibly turn out.