Recipe Overview
Why you’ll love it: These deliciously sweet blondies are made with a doctored-up cake mix and loaded with sprinkles. They are a super easy treat to make and perfect for a party or a special lunchbox goodie!
How long it takes: 5 minutes to prep, 25 to 30 minutes to bake
Equipment you’ll need: mixing bowl, 9 x 9 inch baking pan, oven
Servings: 9
We are blondie fans at my house so I knew these would be a hit the first time I made them. How can you go wrong? Festive sweet blondies with lots of rainbow sprinkles will bring a smile to anyone’s face. You don’t have to be a unicorn fan to love these treats.
Do you know someone who could use a rainbow in their life right now? Make them a batch of these easy blondies. Better yet, invite them to your house for a cup of coffee and a blondie. Send them home with a plate of blondies and a smile.
About Cake Mix Blondies
Seriously easy to make! You can whip them up in five minutes. Since a cake mix is the base of the recipe, you just need to add a few things to the bowl, stir everything up and pop them into the oven.
Convenient. While I generally prefer making my baked goods from scratch, sometimes using a shortcut like a boxed cake mix is a life-saver. Who doesn’t have days when you just don’t have much time to bake but there’s guests coming over or the kids need a treat. A couple more quickie recipes that I fall back on are trail mix cookies, made with refrigerated cookie dough and a few add-ins, and peanut butter cookie bars, with only 5 ingredients.
About Cake Mixes
There are so many types of cake mixes available. It can be a bit overwhelming. Choose the cake mix brand that you like. For this recipe, we found that a regular yellow cake mix works best. A white cake mix does not yield the same results.
Ingredient Notes
- Yellow Cake Mix: Select a 15 oz. box of cake mix, not one of the smaller sized boxes like Jiffy. Just plain yellow cake mix is best.
- Vegetable Oil, Milk, Egg: Normal cake mix stuff, but you’ll use much less for these bars than you would use to make cake.
- Pure Vanilla Extract: Vanilla adds lots of flavor to these blondies.
- Rainbow/Confetti Sprinkles: Sprinkles (or jimmies) add lots of fun and color and are super easy to customize to match the occasion. If you love these festive cookie bars, be sure to try birthday cake pancakes which are adorned with lots of sprinkles.
How to make This Cookie Bar Recipe
Okay, this is how it goes. Get your oven preheating and your pan ready.
Get a medium sized bowl out. Open the cake mix and empty it into the bowl.
Add the oil, milk, egg, and vanilla. Still with me? Mix everything up with a spoon. The mixture will be pretty stiff and not runny like cake batter.
Mix in the sprinkles.
Spread the mixture in the pan. If you want, sprinkle more rainbow sprinkles on top of the batter.
Bake and cool completely (if you can wait that long) and cut into squares. Enjoy with a glass of cold milk or a cup of steaming coffee.
It’s a matter of chocolate. They are both bars but brownies are made with chocolate. Blondies are vanilla flavored.
If you’re into blondies, try this easy blondie recipe (from scratch). Blondies are perfect for add-ins like these Raspberry White Chocolate Blondies, or Chocolate Chip Blondies.
More into brownies? Try these Mocha Brownies, Kahlua Brownies with Cinnamon, or Cream Cheese Filled Brownies.
A blondie is a bar, much denser and more chewy in texture than cake.
Recipe Variations
- Select whatever color of sprinkle you want to celebrate any occasion. Red and green for Christmas, pastel for Easter, bright green for St. Patrick’s Day, pink or red for Valentine’s Day, school colors for game day, etc.
- Add chocolate. Substitute mini chocolate chips for the sprinkles. Increase the amount to ½ cup.
- Frost the blondies for an extra sweet treat and add even more sprinkles to the frosting. Try the frosting recipe in this cookie bar recipe. It works perfectly for cake mix blondies too.
- Make cookies instead. Try my funfetti cookies, an easy-to-make sugar cookie decorated with lots of sprinkles.
Freeze the cookies. For easy lunchbox treats, make a batch of these blondies and freeze in individual resealable bags, all set to pop into lunches. They thaw quickly so they’ll be ready to eat by lunchtime.
These festive bars store really well. After they’ve completely cooled, cut them into squares and arrange them in an airtight container, with waxed paper or parchment between layers. They’ll keep on the counter up to three days, in the fridge for a week, or in the freezer for three months.
What to do with leftover blondies? Hmmmm, let me think. Is there such a thing? Probably not.
Easy Bar Recipes
Cake Mix Blondies
Ingredients
- 1 box (15 oz.) yellow cake mix
- ¼ cup vegetable oil
- 3 tablespoons whole milk
- 1 large egg
- 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
- ¼ cup rainbow sprinkles, plus more to top if desired (see note)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°F and grease a 9 x 9-inch baking pan or line it with parchment paper and set aside.
- Mix together cake mix, vegetable oil, milk, egg, and vanilla extract. The batter should be well mixed but it will be stiff. Fold in sprinkles.1 box (15 oz.) yellow cake mix, ¼ cup vegetable oil, 3 tablespoons whole milk, 1 large egg, 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract, ¼ cup rainbow sprinkles, plus more to top if desired
- Transfer batter to the prepared baking pan and spread evenly with a rubber spatula. If desired, spread more sprinkles on top of batter.
- Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool completely before cutting blondies into 9 squares.
Notes
- Cake mix: For best results, use yellow cake mix. Funfetti or white cake mixes result in drier blondies.
- Smaller pan: If using an 8 x 8 -inch pan, bake blondies 30 to 35 minutes.
- Variations: Feel free to substitute different sprinkle colors, depending on the occasion. Mini chocolate chips can be substituted as well (½ cup).
- Storage: Bars will keep on the counter in a tightly covered container for 3 days, or a week in the fridge, or 3 months in the freezer.
Video
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Did You Make This?Share a comment and rating below! I love hearing what you think!
Very good! I made them in a loaf pan and in 25 minutes they were done at the perfect consistency. They aren’t like a traditional blondie, they tend to rise a little more and have a bit of a lighter texture but I guess that’s to be expected with cake mix. My family and friends went crazy over them.
Yes, they’re definitely lighter and more airy than traditional blondies. I’m glad they were a hit, though!
I’m hoping to make this recipe for a grown-up party tonight, but I want to use pecans and dried cranberries. Does not using sprinkles mean I need to add more sugar?
Thank you for the recipe; I don’t have time to work it out for myself!
You won’t need to add more sugar, but my concern is that it would be too many add-ins and they might be too dry or fall apart? But let me know if you give it a try!
Blonde Brownies Question…
I want to make in a 9×13 pan. With my crew I’d never get them out of a9x9 pan before they were devoured by my adult children! Lol.
Maybe double the recipe? How much added cookie time?
Could they also be made in a mini muffin pan?
Thank you for your great recipes!
I haven’t tested them either of these ways, but it should work if you just adjust the cooking time. Let me know how they turn out!
Great recipe for Blonde Brownies
Glad you liked them!