These beautiful Red Velvet Sprinkle Cookies have a delightful surprise filling inside. Take one bite to reveal the colorful red velvet filling covered with a simple sugar cookie and pretty red, white, and pink sprinkles. Bake for Valentine's Day or for any day you want a sweet and colorful cookie.
This page may contain affiliate links, please see my full DISCLOSURE for policy details.
Valentine's Day is on February 14, just in case you forgot and this cookie makes the perfect Valentine's Day treat. Who said you need to give your special someone chocolates? Bake a batch of these easy-to-make and pretty-as-can-be cookies for your celebration.
The base for this cookie is a simple sugar cookie recipe that is divided into two batters. Keep one plain, and flavor and color the other dough for the red velvet filling. The fun part of making these cookies is you get to make a lot of dough balls and roll them in the nonpareil sprinkles.
Jump to:
Why these are a favorite cookie
- You can change the color of the sprinkles for any occasion
- The middle layer can be different flavors or colors
- Once you bake these cookies you can freeze them for later.
- These cookies are perfect for gift giving and they travel well.
Try these other Surprise Inside Sprinkle Cookies
- For St. Patrick's Day make these pretty green and white Mint Surprise Inside Cookies
- Fill your Easter baskets with Raspberry Sprinkle Cookies that are covered in the prettiest pastel sprinkles
- We like to celebrate baseball and these San Francisco Giant Orange and Black Sprinkles Cookies are a fun treat
- Bake a batch of the Red, White, and Blue Sprinkle cookies for your 4th of July Celebration
- Ghosts and goblins love these Halloween Sprinkle Sugar Cookies with a cinnamon filling
- Santa loves these Christmas Sprinkle Cookies with a chocolate filling. Bake a batch for some delicious holiday gifts!
🧾Let's start with the cookie ingredients
A few notes about the ingredients
Sprinkles - For these cookies, I prefer using the nonpareil sprinkles which are just tiny round sugar balls. This type of sprinkle sticks to the dough better keeps its color when baked. and they just look super pretty on a cookie. The Valentine Nonpareil Sprinkles are what you need.
Food color - You can use liquid or gel food color, today, I am using McCormick Red Food color that works well in this recipe.
Vanilla - The vanilla flavor of the outer cookie layer really tastes great with the red velvet layer so make sure to add the flavor to that dough with vanilla extract.
Cocoa powder - Use your favorite unsweetened cocoa powder.
🥄Let's Bake
Ready to bake with me? This cookie recipe is very easy to make, no chilling required, yeah for that! The dough for these cookies is super simple to make, just beat with a mixer and you will end up with one vanilla-flavored dough and a smaller red velvet dough.
Step 1. In a stand mixing bowl, mix the butter and shortening to combine then add the eggs and vanilla and mix thoroughly. Mix in the flour, baking powder, and salt. This is the basic dough.
Step 2. Remove ¾ cup of the dough and put that into a smaller bowl. Next, add melted butter, cocoa powder, powdered sugar, and the red food coloring, and mix this with a spoon to create the red velvet middle layer for the cookie.
Step 3. Prepare two cookie sheets with parchment paper and turn your oven to 375 degrees F.
Step 4. Now the fun begins, not that mixing the dough and turning your oven on wasn't fun, but this is way more fun. Using a tablespoon, scoop the vanilla-flavored dough and roll it into balls, then using a teaspoon, scoop the red velvet dough and roll it into balls. I made 25 of each.
Step 5. To make the complete cookie ball with the red velvet center take the vanilla-flavored dough and flatten it into a round disk.
Step 6. Take the red velvet dough ball and place it in the center of the disk and then wrap the plain dough around the red velvet dough to form a larger ball.
Step 7. Put your sprinkles in a nice big bowl so you can roll the cookie dough balls around. After you roll the two cookie dough balls together, you need to roll the dough ball between your hands several times to warm the dough up so it will get sticky enough for the nonpareils to stick to. Immediately roll the dough balls in the nonpareils.
Step 8. Place on your baking sheet, and when ready, bake for 12 minutes.
While your cookies are baking go get the broom and dustpan to sweep up all the sprinkles that landed and the floor and rolled clear to the next room.
Now when you open that oven door be prepared to say "Oh how cute." I swear I say that every time.
Baking tips
- Roll each of the dough into balls, I usually get 25 of each. Sometimes I have to pinch dough from one or two balls to get enough dough to make 25.
- Make sure the nonpareil are in a large bowl so you can roll the dough ball around.
- Once you make the big dough ball immediately roll that in the sprinkles while it is still warm and a bit sticky. If you wait to roll the balls the sprinkles will not stick.
- You do not have to chill this dough, but if you find it to be too soft, pop the dough in the fridge for 15 minutes to firm it up.
More cookie recipes
Like what you see? Make sure you are following One Hot Oven for more tasty, sweet, and savory recipes! Pinterest | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter |
Recipe
Red Velvet Surprise Inside Valentine's Cookies
As an Amazon Associate I earn income from qualifying purchases.
Share on Facebook Pin Recipe GrowIngredients
- ½ cup butter room temperature
- ¼ cup solid shortening such as Crisco
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- ½ tsp. baking powder
- ¼ tsp. salt
- 1 egg
- 2 egg yolks
- 2 tsp. vanilla
- 2 ½ cups AP flour
- ⅓ cups powdered sugar sifted
- 2 tablespoons cocoa powder sifted
- 1 tablespoons unsalted butter melted
- 1 tsp. red food color
- 2 4 oz bottles red, white and pink nonpareil sprinkles
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 375°F, and prepare two cookie sheets with parchment paper or a Silpat
- In a large mixing bowl beat the butter and shortening until fluffy on medium speed. You can also use your stand mixer with the paddle attachment.
- Add the sugar, the egg and egg yolks and vanilla then mix on medium speed until combined, scraping the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula
- Mix in the flour, baking powder, and salt on medium speed until combined, forming a soft dough.
- Remove ¾ cup of the dough to a small bowl and add the sifted powdered sugar, cocoa powder, red food coloring, and melted butter. Mix well with a spoon to combine.
- Pour the sprinkles into a large bowl, that is big enough to roll the cookie dough balls around.
- Measure out 1 tablespoon of vanilla dough and make 25 balls with the dough
- Measure out 1 teaspoon of the red velvet dough and shape it into 25 1" balls.
- Flatten the vanilla-flavored dough balls into a disk and place a red velvet dough ball in the center and mold the dough around it to make a round ball.
- Roll the dough ball several times in your hands to warm the dough up. The dough ball needs to be warm for the nonpareils to stick to the dough.
- Roll the ball in the nonpareil sprinkles and place on a parchment-lined baking sheet.
- Bake for 12 minutes at 375 degrees. Remove and let cool for 5 minutes then move to a cooling rack.
- Store the cookies in an airtight container for several days.
Notes
Nutrition
First Published: February 05, 2017... Last Updated: Dec 20, 2021
Pin now to bake later
Have a Happy Valentine's Day.
Thank you for stopping by the One Hot Oven blog. Please leave a comment to say Hello or just let me know what you are baking these days, I always love hearing from fellow bakers. Have any questions or just want to chat about the recipe? Contact me here, and I’ll be happy to help!
About Jere’
From learning to cook on a farm in Indiana to culinary school in California, my passion for food is never-ending. Turning on my oven to bake something for friends and family is my happy place, and I am glad to be here at One Hot Oven sharing both sweet and savory recipes with all my baking friends.
Moop Brown
These cookies look so festive and I love the red velvet filling inside. Can't wait to try