Once upon a time, when bus fares were 40p and iPhones were a mere figment of Steve Jobs' imagination, a certain strawberry sissy toasted her sixteenth birthday with a bottle of WKD and a shiny, new, National Insurance number...
Lured partially by the oh-so-satisfying smell of hard-earned £££'s, 'Money! MY money! Juicy tracksuits all round!', but mainly by the smell of freshly baked cookies, I tied up the strings of my burgundy apron, put on my Millie's cap and began a year long love/hate relationship with a pair of holey oven gloves.
To this day, nothing quite matches up to the memory of ducking down behind the counter and eating a sneaky cookie straight from the oven, while my Millie's BFF stood guard, eagerly awaiting her turn.
There was just something about those chewy, gooey, chocolate-chunked hunks...
Luckily for me, it means that I have more than a few cookie related secrets up my sleeve - so when cravings call, those doughy delights are only a bag of sugar and a few packets of smarties away!
To make your own 'Millies-style' Smartie Cookie Pops you will need:
100g light brown sugar
120g caster sugar
225g self-raising flour
1 egg
125g butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon salt
2-3 tubes of smarties
Ice cream/lollipop sticks
(the perfect excuse to buy a box and eat them all!)
Preheat oven to 180°C
Soften the butter in a mixing bowl...
Cream together with both types of sugar.
Add the vanilla and egg, mix well.
Sift in the flour and add the salt. Combine until you have formed a soft dough.
Take a small handful of dough, roll into a ball, then squidge into a cookie shape.
You want them to be big enough to hold 5-6 smarties. Place on to a baking tray, then gently push your lollipop stick into the dough.
Decorate with smarties!
Now, the MOST important part of baking a Millie's cookie is to not over-bake.
We're cooking cookies, not biscuits, yo!
Justttt as they are starting to set and go ever so slightly brown around the edges (which should be after around 8 minutes) take them out of the oven and leave them to cool. They will harden slightly, but still be full of gooey-goodness!
Sshhhhh! Just don't tell anybody we told you...
You can thank us later! ;)