Peanut Butter-Stuffed Milk Chocolate Sandwich Cookies
February 11, 2010
Snow Day! What’d you do to celebrate? I made cookies!
I have been particularly happy with this month’s Every Day with Rachael Ray and not just because of their crazy in-depth pizza article. One of my favorite contributors to Rachael’s mag is Silvana Nardone. I made her Cheesecake-Filled Pumpkin Cupcakes from the November issue and as soon as I laid eyes on this month’s Peanut Butter-Stuffed Milk Chocolate Sandwich Cookies, I knew I had to have them.
Silvana explains, “The truth is, I can’t ever seem to get enough of the classic combo of milk chocolate and peanut butter. Bite into these sandwich cookies and I swear you’ll be thinking exactly what I am - Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups!” Something tells me that she and I would get along.
Are you signing up for a subscription yet?
These cookies are kind of a cross between french macaroons and chocolate crinkles. They are low in flour and primarily made of chocolate. Beating the eggs and sugar so furiously gives them a caramelized flavor which goes really nicely with the milk chocolate. Upon taking a bite of one of the cookies, Taste Tester asked me about the filling I was about to make. He declared, “salty, it’s gotta be salty!” Sure enough, I checked the recipe and there was a healthy amount of salt in it. This chick knows her stuff.
Can you see how smooth and creamy the filling is? Mmm.
One of the best things about this delicious recipe is that it comes together fast, so you will be biting into these chewy, chocolatey, melt-in-your-mouth cookies before you know it. Now stop drooling and go make some!
The recipe isn’t up on the magazine’s site yet, so you can find it after the break. Their site also had this feature up on their homepage last week:
You can see why I am a fan!
Update: The original recipe is now posted at Everyday with Rachael Ray.
Some recipe tips:
- You’ll need to whip the eggs into submission. With my dinky hand mixer, I had to beat the egg mixture for nearly 10 minutes instead of 5 as the recipe instructed.
- These cookies are nice and soft if you take them out early enough. Fifteen minutes should be about perfect. They’ll look under-baked but they’ll firm up a lot once cool.
- Make sure that whatever peanut butter you use is one that you really love. Since you’re just adding a small amount of butter, sugar and salt to it, it’s the primary ingredient in the filling.
- I used 3 oz of bittersweet chocolate in the dough because I was a little low on milk chocolate, but I’m sure they’re great either way!
From Everyday with Rachael Ray Magazine
Yields 8
Ingredients
2 1/2 cups (15 oz) milk chocolate chips
4 Tbsp unsalted butter at room temperature, divided
1/4 cup plus 2 Tbsp flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt, divided
2 eggs, at room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
3 Tbsp confectioner's sugar
Directions
1. Preheat the oven to 350. Line 2 cookie sheets with parchment paper. In a medium, microwaveable bowl, melt together 2 cups chocolate chips and 2 Tbsp butter on medium power until almost melted, about 1 1/2 minutes; stir just until smooth.
2. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and 1/4 tsp salt. Using an electric mixer, beat together the eggs, granulated sugar and vanilla at high speed until thickened and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Mix in the melted chocolate at medium speed; whisk in the flour mixture. Stir in the remaining 1/2 cup chocolate chips. Refrigerate the dough until firm enough to scoop, but still soft, 10 to 15 minutes.
3. Onto each prepared pan, drop rounded Tbsps of dough 2 inches apart. Bake, switching and rotating the pans halfway through baking, until the cookies appear bubbly and still soft, about 15 minutes. Let cool completely.
4. In a medium bowl, beat together the remaining 2 Tbsp butter and the peanut butter. Sift in the confectioner's sugar and the remaining 1/4 tsp salt; beat until fluffy. On the flat side of each of 8 cookies, spread about 1 1/2 Tbsp of the peanut butter mixture; sandwich with the remaining cookies.