Danny Dines: The half-pound cookie

I give the people what they want, and what y’all want is more sweets!

Word on the block is that one of the biggest cookies can be found right here in the City of Vision, and I found it at Delectable Baking Co.

Delectable Baking Co. is one of the newest businesses in Rio Rancho and is home to the Half Pound Cookie.

“A good friend of ours gave us the idea; they were getting these half-pound cookies sent to them from New York, and they were like, ‘I have never found a bakery in New Mexico who has done this’,” baker and owner Xandria Molinari said. “Now, it has turned into a whole thing.”

A half-pound cookie is a lot of cookie. In fact, 350 of them weigh more than me. You do the math.

I need to go on a diet. The day before I indulged in the cookie, I ate three plates of Thanksgiving food. Keep in mind, I am not that person who refuses to try the green bean casserole or the person who eats small portions to save room for pumpkin pie. I put everything on my plate, and I eat it … then I eat my pumpkin pie — only because I earned it.

Maybe I will go on a diet, but not today, or next week, because Delectable Baking Co. has different variations of their half-pound cookies that rotate every week.

Luckily, I was the first to try their orange creamsicle cookie, which will be part of this week’s rotation.

In total, I ordered three cookies: the OG Nutella (their most popular cookie), the Dirt N’ Worms, and the orange creamsicle. For funsies, I also ordered a cinnamon roll, and if I could eat more, I would have ordered the cookies n’ cream cookie, too.

To no surprise, the cookies and the cinnamon roll were monstrous in size!

I started with the Dirt N’ Worms cookie, and the presentation was flawless. It was a chocolate cookie decorated with a couple gummy worms, an Oreo cookie and a six pack of a Hershey’s bar. This cookie tastes exactly like Dirt N’ Worms; when you take a bite, the Hershey’s bar is melty and gives it the pudding texture of Dirt N’ Worms. The cookie had a soft, delicious brownie texture to make things even better.

Next, I tried the OG Nutella, and this one tasted like the greatest chocolate chip cookie ever created. The outer part was crispy, and the inner part was soft and warm. It had some chocolate chips in it and a slab of Nutella on the inside that made it gooey and delicious.

When I finished trying the OG Nutella, I looked over and there it was … fresh out of the oven was the orange creamsicle cookie.

The orange creamsicle was another giant cookie decorated with fresh vanilla frosting on top and a candied orange. We broke it in half, and on the inside was a heap of gooey vanilla frosting. It tasted like a bomb sugar cookie mixed with tangy, citrusy orange flavors, and the warm vanilla frosting tasted like the frosting that people put on cinnamon rolls.

These cookies deserve all the hype and are well worth a trip. Molinari even hinted that peppermint and eggnog half-pound cookies could be coming very soon.

Delectable Baking Co. is open from 7:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturdays.

It is located at 2740 Northern Blvd. NE, Rio Rancho, and the bakery can be reached by calling 702-860-0224.

Where should I go next? Email me at zunigasauce@gmail.com