EAGLE RIVER, ALASKA — “Weird gourmet” cookie startup Molly Bz, which launched July 2018 in Eagle River, Alaska, is venturing into the freezer aisle with the launch of its sub brand, The Trashy Gourmet. The first product to be introduced by The Trashy Gourmet will be frozen, par-baked air fryer cookies.
“Air fryer everything is hot right now,” said Molly Blakeley, founder of Molly Bz. “We’re going to be doing a lot of fun things like the air fryer cookies under the sub brand.”
While the air fryer cookies are not officially on the market yet, the company is in talks with Costco, Walmart and Target — a few of the stores Molly Bz is currently in.
“It usually takes months to launch,” Blakeley said. “Because I had a lot of the buyers information already, I went back to them and would ask them who their freezer department buyer was and they were able to connect me. We also have stores interested in getting them in the refrigerated department. We can do that, too. The difference is that the ones in the freezer can freeze up to a year. The refrigerator will be four months, you’re going to have to add preservatives so they stay longer.
“But for different buyers, there was more interest in the refrigeration at Costco, which is interesting to me because refrigeration already has (cookie) dough. Maybe it’s because no one is doing air fryer cookies in the area.”
Friends and family have been the company’s primary investors, Blakeley said.
With the launch of the sub brand, the company is seeking larger investors for its Series A funding round.
“The goal is to raise $3 million,” she said. “This will help us grow faster, our advertising, attending expos, packaging, ingredients and more of everything.”
The Trashy Gourmet air fryer cookies will launch with an “OG” (original gangster) flavor of chocolate chip.
Additional flavors will include Let’s Go Nuts, a peanut butter cookie; and a Celebration cookie, a sugar cookie with sprinkles.
“I’m a newer brand so I want to get the customer’s trust,” she said. “So, I’m going to start out with chocolate chip.”
Blakeley began experimenting with preparing cookies in her air fryer at home.
She first began with raw cookie dough, which she noticed took as long to cook in the air fryer as it did in an oven. She then switched to half-baked dough and finally three-quarters baked, which ended up being the company’s main iteration.
“I knew I wanted it as a freezer item,” Blakeley said. “Having it come from a freezer also changes the timeline in the air fryer. Thawed to frozen, that was a whole new adventure.”
Air fryers, which are a mini convection oven, use different heating elements and a fan to circulate hot air to cook foods from the outside in. The method results in crispier foods.
Not all air fryers are made equal, though. For some air fryer models, the air flow is different.
With basket-style air fryers, the air flows from the bottom up. With tray-style air fryers, the air flows from the back or sides of the machine and for hybrid air fryer and toaster ovens, the air flows from the top or rear, Blakeley said.
“Air fryer models vary in air flow direction, which affects the cooking results,” she said. “I had to keep these things in mind when seeing if it would work on a frozen cookie.”
Figuring out the temperature and cooking times for the frozen, par-baked air fryer cookies was trial and error, Blakeley said. Particularly for the chocolate chip flavor.
“I have pan liners at home for the air fryer so that when the chocolate does melt, it would help,” she said. “The chocolate gets gooey. It does start to melt a little bit, but just not any more than if you’re baking them in the oven. It’s (the air fryer) is just faster. The cookies will not come with a liner. Maybe down the road we would do it, it would just bring up the price.
“For a gooey cookie, we cooked it for three minutes. For a cookie with a little crisp on the edges and top and gooey in the middle we cooked the cookie for four minutes. For crunchy cookies we did six minutes.”
Other variables Blakeley had to keep in mind for the cookie’s formulation were sugar ratios, leavening agents and fat types.
“I had to consider factors like spread, chewiness and browning,” she said. “Butter is always the winner. Baking soda causes a crunch that baking powder doesn’t, but baking powder helps the rise. (Also) not over mixing the dough is very important to keeping the dough from going flat.”
The air fryer cookies, Blakeley said, were developed to be a convenient, sweet treat for “lazy baker” consumers and for those who may not want to cook an entire batch of cookies.
“We’re definitely solving something for dorm rooms,” she said. “These cookies make it easier if you have a deli or coffee shop and want to offer a fresh baked cookie while you’re making a sandwich or coffee. Throw it in the toaster oven and it’s done in three minutes.
“It’d be exactly the same to cook in a toaster oven. They kind of work like the air fryer, except for the air fryers are like a mini convection oven, kind of. The toaster ovens usually have the heat that come from one direction; so that’s the biggest difference.”
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