Hi everyone.
I was hoping someone who has taken a food course or something would know the answer to my question.

A little back story. I was talking with my mom this evening and she said that she had bought several pkg's of the pillsbury halloween cookie dough. You know the kind you find in the refrigerated section of the grocery store. They have pumkins or ghosts in the middle of the dough.
Anyway, mom bought this a few days back and meant to put them in the freezer in the garage until she was ready to bake them today. When she went out to get them today, she realized she hadn't actually placed them in the freezer but must've placed them on a box near the freezer. So they were unrefrigerated for a few days out there. Mom baked them up today, but then thought twice about bringing them to our party tommorrow and went out and bought a few new pkgs of it today. BUT>>>here is the part i"m concerned about...she's eating the cookies from the unrefrigerated dough. She baked them up and figured instead of throwing them out SHE would eat them. I was freaking out when she told me this because she wouldn't let US eat them but she's going too..OMG!
Can she get really sick from eating that 'old' batch?? The high temps in our area was around 56degrees and the nights in the 40-35degrees. The garage is closed.
She says by baking them it kills any bacteria that has grown. I'm not so convinced. I would never have eaten the cookies made with the unrefrigerated pkg's. I'm super careful with all food safety. I'm worried for her because she has a weakened immune system to boot. She never takes that seriously, and i do all the worrying. Can anyone put my mind at ease tonight?

I guess i'll know the answer in the morning if she is throwing up and sick.

Hmmm, I wouldn't eat it either.

I hope she okay.

Ehhhh..... I wouldn't. I figure anything sold in the cooler section of the grocery store should not be left out anywhere for too long.

She might have killed bacteria, but she didn't necessarily degrade the toxins that bacteria release. Different kinds of bacteria act in different ways, which is why it takes two days to get sick from some foods, and four hours to get sick from others; if there is a pre-formed toxin, it's much faster than if the bacteria have to colonize and perform in your gut (think salmonella in the raw chicken vs staph in the potato salad). Cookies are only baked for a brief time, so while that may be enough to kill of the regular amount of colonies present in a fresh unpasteurized egg, for example, it doesn't mean the unrefrigerated dough hadn't started to spoil already in and of itself (whether or not it makes you sick, that's just kind of gross), and it doesn't mean the larger-than-usual amount of toxins were actually degraded. Long story short, I know you wanted us to put your mind at ease, but I think it might just be best to toss the $4 worth of cookies, and buy her some fresh ones. Sorry!

I know right! I was shocked she told me she was eating them. She's old school thinking..cooking/baking kills everything. Sometimes i go over there and I notice she breaks soooo many of the rules of proper food handling, it scares me that one day she is gonna get really sick from it. I know she thinks i'm hyper concerned about keeping food safe, surfaces clean but man you can get really ill if you don't handle stuff proper.
I sure do hope she is ok from eating them. I did tell her she shouldn't eat them and her response was, "well, the few i ate were almost burnt so i'm sure there is nothing in there that will hurt me."
I wish she would take it all more seriously. I worry so much about her. Mothers!

I would be concerned selling her any cake... guests may get sick from her improper food handling and blame the cake... that was the first thing on my mind!!
Ive seen someone handle raw chicken then wipe their hands on a dish towel, then wipe the counter with that dish towel, and the dishes.... yum....

cakeanddazzle...well she WAS smart/concerned enough not to feed them to all of us so she had to have an idea that it MAY not be safe to eat. She clearly didn't want to put us in harms way.
Mom's not that bad..she does wash her hands after working with poultry, but..she does let it thaw in the sink all day long. My issues fall mostly with how she refrigerates or doesn't refrigerate stuff, thawing meats, length of time food is kept.
It just baffles me that while she was concerned enough for us, she clearly wasn't concerned about herself.

That's got to be rough, sweetcravings! I'm sorry you and your mom have had to go through everything you've gone through ... it IS hard with parents, though. And while I'm sure she loves having such a considerate and loving daughter as you, it must be hard for her, too, to relinquish that supervisory role a bit. I'm a doctor, and my dad knows the training I went through and the work I do, and tries his very darnedest to respect my professional opinion and follow it. Still, I know I'm also his little girl, and when I'm done giving him my reasons for making a decision, he still beams at me like I'm 6 and just read a really long word, and then goes off and does whatever he thinks is best (and he's a highly educated man, mind you, with two masters' degrees who speaks seven languages ... but it's hard for him sometimes to have his baby direct elements of his life). I guess the best you can do is put that little "mosquito" of a doubt in her head about the cookies, and hope she takes it to heart and throws them out. Good luck!