First things first, preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper — we’re not trying to wrestle cookies off the pan later.

In a medium bowl, whisk together your flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. Keep it aside — this is your “cookie backbone,” aka the stuff that keeps your cookies from collapsing into sad little puddles.

Grab a big bowl (or stand mixer if you’re fancy) and cream the butter with granulated and brown sugar until it’s light, fluffy, and basically looks like soft clouds of happiness. This part smells like pure joy, babe.

Next, beat in your egg, vanilla, and red food coloring until it’s all one gorgeous, red swirl. Look at that color — it’s dramatic, it’s fun, it’s basically your mood in cookie form.

Now comes the best part: fold in the cream cheese. Yes, cream cheese in cookies. Don’t worry, it won’t make them cheesecake-y, just a little soft, tangy, chewy dream. I usually cube mine first so it blends easily without overmixing.

Slowly add your flour mixture to the wet ingredients and fold gently until it’s just combined. Overmixing? Big no-no, babe — we want soft cookies, not hockey pucks. If you’re adding white chocolate or nuts, toss them in here too.

Using a cookie scoop or tablespoon, drop dollops of dough onto your parchment-lined sheet. Space them out because they’ll spread a little — but not too much, we’re not trying to make cookie pancakes.

Pop them in the oven for about 10–12 minutes. Watch the edges for that tiny golden kiss, but the centers should still look slightly soft. Don’t overbake, babe — cookies keep cooking a bit after they come out, and we want chewy, not sad.

Let the cookies chill on the sheet for 5 minutes before transferring them to a wire rack. Trust me, if you try to eat them right away, your taste buds will forgive you, but the cookie structure might not.