Strawberry Whoopie Pies

I have never made whoopie pies before, but saw these on Pinterest and wanted to try them out for Valentine’s Day.

The recipe I found called for a box of strawberry cake mix. You can get almost anything you want…at any hour…in NYC, with the exception of certain grocery store items. Our grocery stores are small and do not carry the immense variety you see in the suburbs. As there was no strawberry cake mix, I decided to use fresh strawberries in the recipe.

The batter smells delicious when you use fresh strawberries! I did not add any food coloring to these—the subtle pink is all from the strawberries. 

I used only egg whites, as I wanted the batter to be really white to showcase the pink of the strawberries. 

Alex loves helping stir. 

Once I scooped out the batter, I used the spoon to try and make them more uniform circles. 

Ooops! He got a little overzealous—I guess this batch will just be for us. 

Enjoying the fruits of his labor. 

These have a very subtle strawberry taste. 

Andy said these are one of his favorite cookies of all times. I will definitely be making these again!

 INGREDIENTS – COOKIE PORTION

1 box of white cake mix

4 egg whites

1/4 cup of vegetable oil (I use olive oil in almost everything I do)

1 tablespoon of water

10 fresh strawberries, washed, hulled and pureed (I used my Cuisinart to do this)

INGREDIENTS – FILLING

2 sticks of butter, softened

3 ½ cups of powdered sugar

1 tablespoon of almond extract

DIRECTIONS

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
• In a large bowl, combine cake mix, eggs, water and oil.  Stir/whip together until smooth.
• Line your cookie sheets with parchment paper (or spray them) and then use a tablespoon to scoop out onto the sheet.
• Bake for seven minutes, transfer to a wire rack and cool. 
• For the icing, whip together butter, sugar, and almond extract until light and fluffy.
• Put icing on the bottom part of the cookie, top with another, similar shaped cookie. I used a pastry bag to pipe the frosting on the cookies, but you can just as easily use a knife. 

My Pinterest image.