World Peace Cookies

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I know, I know. Everyone else made these months and months ago. I’m late to the party as usual. But better late than never, right? In this case, most definitely!

I knew these cookies would be good before I even took the first batch out of the oven. The sliced dough tasted awesome, my kitchen smelled amazing delicious, and the finished product is out of this world–chocolatey with a bit of salt. Mmmm. If you’re looking for a really easy-to-make yet outstanding chocolate cookie recipe, I highly recommend this one.

And in case you were wondering why they are called World Peace Cookies, according to the cookbook, Dorie’s neighbor said that a daily dose of these cookies “is all that is needed to ensure planetary peace and happiness.” And I concur.

Ingredients
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 stick plus 3 tablespoons (11 tablespoons) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2/3 cup (packed) light brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon fleur de sel or 1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
5 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped into chips, or a generous 3/4 cup store-bought mini chocolate chips

Preparation

1. Sift the flour, cocoa and baking soda together.
2. Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter on medium speed until soft and creamy. Add both sugars, the salt and vanilla extract and beat for 2 minutes more.
3. Turn off the mixer. Pour in the dry ingredients, drape a kitchen towel over the stand mixer to protect yourself and your kitchen from flying flour and pulse the mixer at low speed about 5 times, a second or two each time. Take a peek — if there is still a lot of flour on the surface of the dough, pulse a couple of times more; if not, remove the towel. Continuing at low speed, mix for about 30 seconds more, just until the flour disappears into the dough — for the best texture, work the dough as little as possible once the flour is added, and don’t be concerned if the dough looks a little crumbly. Toss in the chocolate pieces and mix only to incorporate.
4. Turn the dough out onto a work surface, gather it together and divide it in half. Working with one half at a time, shape the dough into logs that are 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Wrap the logs in plastic wrap and refrigerate them for at least 3 hours. (The dough can be refrigerated for up to 3 days or frozen for up to 2 months. If you’ve frozen the dough, you needn’t defrost it before baking — just slice the logs into cookies and bake the cookies 1 minute longer.)

Getting Ready to Bake

1. Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone mats.
2. Using a sharp thin knife, slice the logs into rounds that are 1/2 inch thick. (The rounds are likely to crack as you’re cutting them — don’t be concerned, just squeeze the bits back onto each cookie.) Arrange the rounds on the baking sheets, leaving about 1 inch between them.
3. Bake the cookies one sheet at a time for 12 minutes — they won’t look done, nor will they be firm, but that’s just the way they should be. Transfer the baking sheet to a cooling rack and let the cookies rest until they are only just warm, at which point you can serve them or let them reach room temperature.

Makes about 36 cookies.

Storage
Packed airtight, cookies will keep at room temperature for up to 3 days; they can be frozen for up to 2 months.

My note: I was too lazy to cut up chocolate so I used mini chips instead.

Recipe from Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan.

Excuses, Excuses

Why I haven’t been trying new recipes lately:

Recipe Index

I installed a plugin that created a recipe index for this blog. You can now see a list of recipes by category without having to scroll through a big mess. I’m still tweaking the HTML and trying to adjust the spacing but hope to have it fixed soon. Enjoy!

Toffee Cupcakes With Caramel Frosting

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There are good, but not great. The cupcakes are quite moist, but pretty bland. The frosting is super sweet, and sort of overpowers the simplicity of the cupcake. The cupcake recipe suggested making either caramel frosting, buttercream frosting, or chocolate fudge frosting. I think if I were to make these again, I’d use chocolate frosting.

[Edited to add: My coworkers give these a thumbs up. Apparently I’m in the minority.]

Also, the frosting recipe said to stir 10 to 15 minutes or until thickened. However, I couldn’t get it to thicken very much, and was afraid if I kept it on the heat the caramel would burn. Consequently, it ended up more of a caramel ice cream topping consistency than a frosting consistency. But it still tasted good, albeit really sweet.

Cupcakes
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
pinch of salt
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup butter, at room temperature
2 egg whites
2/3 buttermilk
2/3 cup toffee bits

1. In a small bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
2. In a bowl, using an electric mixer, beat together brown sugar and butter until well combined. Add egg whites, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Alternately beat in flour mixture and buttermilk, making three additions of flour mixture and two of buttermilk, beating until smooth. Add toffee bits, beating until smooth.
3. Scoop batter into prepared pan. Bake in preheated oven for 20 to 25 minutes or until tops of cupcakes spring back when lightly touched. Let cool in pan on rack for 10 minutes. Remove from pan and let cool completely on rack. Top cooled cupcakes with frosting.

Yields one dozen.

Frosting
1 cup whipping (35% cream)
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/4 cup light corn syrup
1 tbsp unsalted butter
1/4 tsp salt

1. In a heavy saucepan, combine cream, brown sugar, corn syrup, butter, and salt. Heat over medium-high heat, stirring, for 2 minutes or until sugar is dissolved and butter is melted.
2. Reduce heat to medium. Cook, stirring often, for 10 to 15 minutes or until thickened. Remove from heat. Stir until smooth and pour into a bowl. Let cool in bowl, stirring occasionally. Caramel will thicken further as it sits and cools.
3. Stir cooled caramel well and spread or spoon over cooled cupcakes.

My notes:

• Make the frosting before the cupcakes so it has time to cool.
• Don’t be lame like me and put the frosting in an aluminum bowl to cool. Duh.

Recipes from 125 Best Cupcake Recipes.

I’m Still Here

I just haven’t tried any new recipes lately. However, I have gotten my baking business started.

I know I don’t need to apologize for the lack of new posts, but I feel badly when I don’t update this blog. So here’s a non-recipe update for ya. I know, total cop out post. Anyway, I’m hoping to try a new cupcake recipe this week and will post about it if it actually happens. (Life has been busy!) If I don’t get to it, there won’t be any recipes until after Passover because really, I have no new Passover recipes to try; I think we’ve found all the good ones. Speaking of Passover recipes, if that’s what you’re looking for, they’re over here. The matzo brittle and apple crisp are my family’s faves.

Have a good Pesach/Easter!

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