Oatmeal Butterscotch Cookies

Butterscotch is pretty close to chocolate on my list of favorite dessert flavors.  I’m definitely drawn to desserts with butterscotch, and I think it goes really well in oatmeal, so these cookies jumped out at me.  I also wanted to try using oat flour in the place of regular flour.  I used a food processor to process the oats to the right consistency, then replaced them for the regular flour in the recipe.  This worked out quite well, and gave the cookies a great texture and flavor.  These were delicious cookies- very chewy, and the butterscotch gave them more depth.

Oatmeal Butterscotch Cookies
Source: Erin’s Food Files (originally Cindy McCain’s recipe published in Good Housekeeping)

Ingredients:

3/4 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour (I used oat flour)
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
3/4 tsp salt
3 cups rolled oats
1 1/2 cups butterscotch chips

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375F. Line a baking pan with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugars. Blend in eggs and vanilla until mixture is smooth.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Stir into butter mixture, then mix in the oats and butterscotch chips.

Drop rounded tablespoonfuls (large balls) of cookie down onto the prepared baking sheets, leaving about 2 inches between each cookie to allow for spread.

Bake for 10-11 minutes, until the edges begin to brown. Let cookies cool on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely before storing in an airtight container.

Chockablock Cookies (TWD)

I love mix-ins.  It’s my favorite part of a brownie, cookie, ice cream, or pretty much any other treat.  So, it should come as no surprise that I liked these.  These cookies are so full of mix-ins, and so adaptable to your tastes.  I used walnuts, coconuts, and chocolate chips, but wished I had used some raisins too.  They would also be good with butterscotch chips, white chocolate chips, craisins, pecans, M&Ms…the possibilities are endless.  These had such fabulous texture too- they remained soft and chewy after baking, and were able to handle all the added ingredients.  They were sweet, but not too sweet to where you couldn’t enjoy the cookie.  You really can’t go wrong with these!  Mary chose the recipe, which you can find on her blog, and you can visit the TWD blog so see everyone’s variations.

EDIT: I wanted to add that I used all butter and it worked out just fine.  I rarely have shortening on hand!

Chewy Chocolate Cookies

Oh, how I love the Pastry Queen!  I saw these cookies when I was flipping through her cookbook when I first got it for Christmas and immediately put them on my list.  They are so simple to make, and have helped me satisfy a chocolate craving in no time 🙂  I also like how easy it is to adapt them to your tastes.  You can make them very simple, or you can add in things such as coconut, various nuts, and chocolate chips.  I think these would even be good with white chocolate or peanut butter chips.  This time I kept the pecans that the recipe called for and added in coconut and chocolate chips.  I really liked them that way, and will keep trying new versions in the future.

Chewy Chocolate Cookies
Source: Pastry Queen Christmas by Rebecca Rather

2 cups whole pecans

3 large egg whites

2 ¼ cups powdered sugar

6 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder

Pinch of kosher salt

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Arrange the pecans on a rimmed baking sheet in a single layer and toast them for 7 to 9 minutes, until darker in color and aromatic.  Remove from the oven, transfer to a bowl, let cool, and coarsely chop.

Reduce oven temperature to 300 degrees.  Line baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone mats.

In a large bowl, briskly whisk the egg whites until foamy, about 30 seconds.  Stir in the powdered sugar, cocoa, salt, vanilla, and pecans.  Using a 1-inch-diameter scoop, drop spoonfuls of dough 1 ½ inches apart on the prepared pans.  Bake for 8 to 10 minutes, until set and shiny, with zigzag cracks on top.  Remove from the oven and let cool on the pans for 5 to 10 minutes.  Using a metal spatula, transfer the cookies to wire racks to cool completely.  The cookies will keep for up to 1 week in an airtight container or 3 weeks tightly wrapped and frozen.

Flourless Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies

I first used these cookies as the crust for this Chocolate Peanut Butter Cheesecake, but I started thinking about them again and thought they deserved a post of their own.  The chocolate peanut butter combination is irresistible to me, and it’s very good in cookie form.  I was particularly excited about these being flourless, which makes them naturally gluten free, so no adaptations were necessary.  These take almost no time to make, and will satisfy your craving in a hurry!  The chocolate and peanut butter flavors are nicely balanced, and neither is too overpowering.  I didn’t have peanut butter chips on hand, but I will definitely add them next time because I think it would improve the flavor even more.

Flourless Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies
Source: Baking Bites

1 cup crunchy peanut butter

¾ cup brown sugar

1 large egg

½ teaspoon vanilla extract (optional, but I’ve always added it)

½ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

1 ½ tablespoons cocoa powder

2 tablespoons water

½ to ¾ cup chocolate and/or peanut butter chips

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

In a small bowl, whisk together cocoa powder and water until smooth.  In a large bowl, combine remaining ingredients (except chips), including water and cocoa mixture.  Stir in chocolate and/or peanut butter chips.

Drop by tablespoons onto prepared baking sheet and flatten slightly.  Bake for about 10-13 minutes, until golden brown at the edges.  Cool on pan before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes 2 dozen

Dulce de Leche Duos (TWD)

I was pretty excited about these when I saw that we’d get to make them.  I love dulce de leche, and I’m always looking for ways to bake with it.  I also think sandwich cookies are a lot of fun, so I got the best of both worlds.  These cookies were incredible simple to make.  I loved that they had dulce de leche in both the cookie and in the filling.  They had a rich, full caramel flavor and were perfectly soft and chewy.  I made these to take to a meeting, but David and I loved them so much that we had quite a few the night I was making them 🙂  Definitely a winner in our house!  You can view the recipe on Jodie’s blog and see the other cookies everyone made by going to the TWD blog.

Peanut Butter-Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

I love when I see recipes that have my favorite ingredients.  I got the itch to bake something recently, and immediately thought of these cookies.  The combination of oatmeal, peanut butter, and chocolate is pretty hard to resist, and these cookies put these ingredients together beautifully.  They are soft and chewy, and have just the right amount of crispness on the outside.  The peanut butter flavor stands out and complements the other flavors really well.  I used a mix of peanut butter chips and chocolate chips for extra peanut butter flavor.  I must also admit that the dough is pretty hard to resist!  I found myself eating a lot of dough during the baking process 🙂  Be careful not to overbake these.  They won’t look done after 10 minutes, but they will be perfectly done a few minutes after you take them out of the oven.

Peanut Butter-Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
Source: Brown Eyed  Baker

Makes about 16 cookies

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt
1 stick (½ cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
½ cup creamy peanut butter
½ cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup light brown sugar
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg
½ cup rolled oats
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips (I used a mixture of chocolate chips an peanut butter chips)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.

2. Whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.

3. On medium speed, cream together the butter, peanut butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar and vanilla extract, about 3 minutes. Add the egg and beat to combine. On low speed, gradually add the flour until just combined. Stir in the oats, and then the chocolate chips.

4. Use a large cookie scoop (3 tablespoons) and drop dough onto prepared baking sheets about 2 inches apart. Bake for 10 minutes, or until the cookies are lightly golden. Cool completely on the baking sheet and then store in an airtight container at room temperature.

Peanut Butter Cookie Cups with Salted Caramel Filling

I love peanut butter, and I love caramel, so when I saw a recipe putting the two together, I couldn’t wait to try it!  The recipe I followed went with regular peanut butter cookies where you make a small indentation, then fill it with caramel after baking.  This did not work for me.  The cookies didn’t keep their indentation, so I needed to fine another method.  Luckily, I made these peanut butter cup treats last year, so I used the mini muffin tin method.  This worked perfectly!  All you need to do is break off a small piece of dough, and fit it into the tin, leaving a small indentation.  After pulling them out of the oven, reinforce that indentation, and it will remain there while cooling.  Once the cookies were cool, I filled them with the salted peanut caramel, let them cool a bit more, then drizzled chocolate over them.  It’s nice to have a bite-size dessert, and these would be great for parties because they’re so easy to grab.  These were definitely a hit!  I used the well-known flourless peanut butter cookies, but feel free to use your favorite peanut butter cookie recipe!

Peanut Butter Cookie Cups with Salted Caramel Filling
Source: adapted from David Lebovitz

For the peanut butter cookies:

1 cup peanut butter

1 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1 teaspoon baking powder

Mix all ingredients together.  Divide the dough into tablespoon-size pieces and place in a mini-muffin pan.  Make a small indentation in the dough.  Bake for 12 to 15 minutes.  Press down on the middle of the cookies to make sure the indentation stays.  Once cool, lift them from the tin.  Pour the salted peanut caramel in the well of each cookie.  Allow to cool, then drizzle with melted chocolate.

For the salted peanut caramel

1 cup (250ml) heavy cream
1/2 cup (125ml) water
1 cup (200g) granulated sugar
1 tablespoon light corn syrup or glucose
1/8 teaspoon coarse salt

3/4 cup (100g) finely chopped roasted salted peanuts

optional: 4 ounces bittersweet, semisweet, or milk chocolate, melted

Make the salted peanut caramel by warming the cream in a saucepan or microwave, and setting it aside.Cook the water, 1 cup sugar, corn syrup, and salt to a caramel, gently swirling the pan only if necessary (to ensure it melt and cooks evenly) until it turns a nice golden brown.

Remove from heat and immediately whisk in the hot cream in a slow, steady stream.Cool until warm and pourable, then add the chopped peanuts. Spoon some of the caramel into each cookie, letting it set for about an hour, if you want to drizzle them with chocolate.

Chocolate Chip Cookies (TWD)

I’ve already found a great chocolate chip cookie recipe, so I was skeptical about trying another, but I love eating chocolate chip cookie dough, so I figured that my efforts wouldn’t go to waste, no matter how the cookies turned out.  To me, chocolate chips cookies need to be chewy on the inside, slightly crispy on the outside, and need to have a buttery, molasses-like flavor.  These cookies just didn’t do it for me.  To be fair, I used gluten-free flour in these (unlike the other ones), so it’s not  a fair comparison.  I tried to fix these by chilling the dough and lowering the temperature, but it didn’t seem to affect the results.  They were just flat and got overly browned before they were done.  So, they weren’t my favorite, but I enjoyed eating the dough, and even a less-than-perfect cookie isn’t a bad one.  I should try baking these with regular flour to compare the results, but that’s another experiment for another day 🙂

You can view the recipe on Kait’s blog, and see what everyone else thought by visiting the TWD blog.

Valentine’s Day Cookies with Royal Icing

First of all, Happy Valentine’s Day! (a couple days early)  We don’t make a huge deal out of Valentine’s Day, but it’s always fun to celebrate with cards and some sweet treats 🙂

I’m trying to practice my royal icing skills, and this time, I looked to Valentine’s Day as an excuse to make some cookies!  I’ve gotten better at making designs on the cookies, and love all the creative ways that you can decorate.  One thing that I’m working on is making sure the icing is thin enough.  The icing I used to outline the cookies wasn’t as thin as it should have been, and that made it more difficult to use.  Next time I’ll know to add more water.  I did the outlining and filling early in the afternoon, and in the evening it was dry enough for me to do the designs.  It was my first time writing on the cookies, and I think it went pretty well for my first time!  I’m excited about my next opportunity to decorate and hope that I will continue to get better!

I’m going to link to my previous posts for recipes and decorating tips:

Pumpkin Cookies
St. Patrick’s Day Cookies

Pffernusse

I recently went to a cookie exchange, and the theme was “Cookies From Around the World.”  Just days after I got the invitation, I saw these cookies on Amy’s blog and thought they would be perfect.  Pffernusse are German spice cookies, very similar to ginger cookies.  David and I both have a connection to Germany- he has a lot of German heritage, and I have a little, but I was born in Germany and have always been interested in German culture.  We both even took German in high school and I was lucky enough to spend a month there after my junior year.  This cookie is a basic spice dough, and after letting the cookies cool for about 10 minutes, you roll them in powdered sugar.  I tend to make a lot of spice cookies, because it’s David’s favorite kind.  He really liked these and enjoyed eating the leftovers.  He described them as a spice cake in cookie form.  The smell from baking them just filled up the house.  This is a great Christmas cookie!

Pffernusse
Source: Martha Stewart, as seen on Sing for Your Supper

Pfeffernüsse
-Martha Stewart

1 1/4 cups confectioners’ sugar
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup firmly packed light-brown sugar
1/4 cup unsulfured molasses
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350º. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Place confectioners’ sugar in a brown paper bag (I used a bowl).
In a medium bowl, combine flour, pepper, cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg, cloves, and baking soda. Set aside.
Place butter, brown sugar, and molasses in a bowl of an electric mixer fitted with paddle attachment. Beat on medium speed until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Beat in egg and vanilla. With mixer on low speed, add flour mixture; beat until just combined. Pinch off dough in tablespoon amounts; roll into 1 1/4-inch balls. Arrange balls 1 1/2 inches apart on prepared baking sheets. (Dough can be frozen at this point, covered tightly with plastic wrap, up to 1 month).

Bake until cookies are golden and firm to the touch with slight cracking, about 15 minutes. Transfer sheets to a wire rack to cool slightly, about 10 minutes. Working in batches, place cookies in paper bag; shake until well coated. Let cool completely on wire rack. Store in airtight container.