Local teen hits sweet spot with safe-to-eat cookie dough

Published 2:28 pm Sunday, January 13, 2019

NATCHEZ — Hannah-Grace Hinkle’s cookie dough is a little different, in a good way. It’s super sweet and safe to eat right out of the tub, with no eggs and pre-baked flour.

Within just a few months of marketing her product, people from all over are demanding more of 17-year-old Hannah’s cookie dough, she said.

“At first, people were skeptical,” Hannah said. “It’s not safe to eat raw cookie dough. But once I explained to them that the flour is pre-baked, there are no eggs and it’s totally safe, their response changed. I’ve had people order batches and re-order and order again.”

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Hannah worked as an intern with both a pastry and wedding cake design business for a year in Dallas, Texas, before she and her parents, Dustin and Jenny Hinkle, moved to Natchez in November 2017, she said.

Inspired by a cookie dough shop she visited in Florida last September, Hannah decided to invent her own recipe for edible, raw cookie dough — one without milk or eggs that would be made to last, she said.

“I was already doing some baking, but it wasn’t really my thing,” she said. “I loved pastries, but I figured out cookie dough was more fun for me.”

Hannah said she started to write down more and more flavors she wanted to create and added more as requests came in, making dozens of test batches until she felt she had it each flavor right.

“For me, it was fun,” Hannah said. “I could mix up cookie dough all day and not get bored with it.”

Hannah has created 18 flavors including “The ‘O.G.’ Chocolate Chip,” “Sixteen Candles Funfetti,” “’Totally Nuts’ Hazelnut Chocolate,” “’Ebony & Ivory’ Cookies and Cream” and “’The Girl-Scout’ Brownie Cookie.”

With Dustin’s graphic design skills and Jenny’s artistic hand, the Hinkle family created a brand and label for Hannah’s creations and started “Rolling ‘N’ the Dough.”

“(Hannah) is so amazing with flavors, both savory and sweet,” Jenny said. “If she hadn’t jumped on the wagon and ran with it, (Dustin and I) wouldn’t have taken the idea seriously. But she was so serious about it that we said ‘Okay,’ let’s get the packaging down.”

Together, the Hinkle family built a cart, so Hannah could travel and sell her cookie dough at different venues.

She first introduced her cookie dough to the Natchez Farmer’s Market last October and again at the Natchez Chamber of Commerce Gala the following month, and has now developed 19 different flavors and counting — after her most recent flavor, King Cake, had been added to the mix just last week.

“I started out in the Farmer’s Market, and it just kind of grew from there,” she said.

Hannah hand delivers her cookie dough around the Miss-Lou in either a half pint for $7, a full pint for $10 or giftwrapped with a hand crafted, decorative wooden tray for $19 to $250 depending on the size of the bundle.

More recently, Hannah has started to ship her cookie dough across the nation, making fresh batches for every order, with additional shipping costs.

“We’ve shipped to Florida, Washington, Minnesota and a lot in Texas, as well as made our local deliveries,” she said.

Hannah said her next goal is to have a storefront, where she can market her product in a set location where people can socialize instead of cooking out of her home.

Orders can be placed by calling Hanna at 662-871-8783 or emailing hmhinkle@gmail.com.