Surprise cookies: stupid name for a delicious treat

Recently Jeremy went out of town for a few days on business, and I thought to myself, Self, what better way to welcome home your gent than with a pile of soft, chocolatey cookies with a gooey surprise center? Since I'd be at work when he got home in the middle of the afternoon, I wanted some sort of treat to fill the void of my absence, so he was welcomed by two dozen scrumptious surprise cookies.

Now, as much as Martha Stewart's smug attitude of superiority to the rest of humanity bugs me, the woman knows how to put out an amazing cookbook. I have been loving her Cookies cookbook, which not only features an amazing variety but which is also absolutely beautiful to look at. (It is worth the price of admission alone for the chocolate gingerbread recipe, which is out of this world.) And I appreciate that there is a photo on every page, something that not every cookbook offers. It was here that I found the recipe for Surprise Cookies. I sort of hate the name, because it's vague (a better name would be Hot Chocolate cookies, because that's what they remind me of), but let me tell you: these cookies are the bomb. They are chocolatey, cakey cookies with a piece of marshmallow on top that are then covered in a simple chocolate frosting. So delicious! Check out the recipe and look at the drool-inducing photo I got from the website.

 Mon dieu! Look at that melty, marshmallowy center, peeking coyly out at you! What a flirt!








I did change a few things from the recipe. First off, I found that cutting each marshmallow in half resulted in too thick of a marshmallow, so I cut each jumbo marshmallow into fourths and found that size much easier to work with. But if a giant marshmallow is your thing, by all means, go for it. Second, I didn't bother to sift together the dry ingredients; I whisked them instead, and my batter was just fine. Third, I don't own a stand mixer with a paddle attachment and I have never found that an impediment; a regular hand mixer works just as well. Fourth, I don't have a variety of ice cream scoop sizes, so I just used two spoons and used those to shape the dough. Fifth, I ran out of vanilla extract after I made the batter and it was 10 p.m. and I was in jammies and not about to go to the supermarket to get more vanilla, so I didn't put any into my frosting and it was still scrumptious.

Below is my version of the recipe with my changes and comments integrated. You really should try making these. They are a real joy and everyone I shared them with really liked them. Who doesn't like surprises?


Makes about 2 dozen

• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup cocoa powder (not Dutch processed, although I can't imagine that the world will end if you use Dutch processed cocoa powder)
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened (you can speed up the process by placing the stick on a dish and microwaving at 5 second intervals until it is soft but not yet melting)
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 12 large marshmallows, cut horizontally into four discs (or just in half is fine) *

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or Silpat mats. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside.
2. Using an electric or hand mixer, cream together butter and sugar in a large bowl until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add egg, milk, and vanilla, and beat until well combined. Add the flour mixture about a half cup at a time and mix until it is completely incorporated. The batter will be extremely thick and sticky. Stirring this is a good upper-arm workout.
3. Use two spoons to drop dough onto prepared baking sheets, about 2 inches apart. Scoop up about a walnut-sized gob of dough with one spoon and use the other to shape and scrape the gob into a ball onto the sheet. These cookies do not spread much, so if they aren't spaced quite right, don't worry. Bake until cookies begin to spread and become firm, 8 to 10 minutes.
4. Remove baking sheets from oven, and place a marshmallow in the center of each cookie, pressing down slightly. Return immediately to oven, and continue baking until marshmallows begins to melt, about 2 to 3 minutes. Transfer cookie sheets to a wire rack to cool for about 20 minutes and then remove them from the sheets and place them directly on the racks so that they're cool before frosting. 

Chocolate Frosting

• 2 cups confectioners' (powdered) sugar
• 4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract (optional, as I learned)

1. Melt the butter and cocoa powder together in a small saucepan over low heat, stirring constantly with a spatula, until the butter is completely melted and has completely incorporated with the chocolate.
2. Put the sugar into a large bowl. Pour in the butter mixture and add the milk and vanilla (if using). Whisk everything together until well combined. When I was whisking, I found it a little thick, so I dribble in just a bit more milk and everything smoothed out.
3. Immediately frost each cookie, starting at the center and spreading the frosting with a butter knife to completely cover the marshmallow. Let the cookies sit out in a single layer for a bit and the frosting will firm up. 

These cookies stay fresh and chewy for a few days. Store them in an airtight container in a single layer. The frosting recipe I used actually called for larger amounts of everything, so I ended up with some extra frosting (darn, what a shame) that I stashed in the fridge. 

*Note to my vegetarian friends: If the thought of eating marshamallows is more than you can bear (due to the gelatin), something tells me these cookies would be just as amazing sans marshamallow. Just don't skip out on the frosting. It is amazing!

Heartful of cookie love

I love this article, written by an academic, about how she likes the bake because it's the best way for her to express her affection for others.

She talks about how she and her sister used to bake cookies for her mother on nights when she worked late. It made me think about myself when I was young. I used to do the same thing myself. I loved to bake cookies, oddly, because my mother wasn't really into baking and she never once made cookies. But somehow I was really drawn to cookie recipes, probably because they are relatively simple in terms of technique and relatively quick to bake. And also because, let's face it, who DOESN'T love cookies?

One of my favorite recipes was peanut butter blossoms, a recipe I found in a Pillsbury cookies magazine my mother had probably gotten free as part of a supermarket promotion or something. I remember how much I loved those cookies (even though I made them without the kisses on top, because they were the one ingredient we didn't have just sitting around the house), and I also love how much I enjoying tricking my father into eating them. He hates peanut butter, but yet he ate these cookies every time I made them and said they were good, every time. I guess no one can resist a cookie.

I still enjoy making cookies. I've got some baking books and am enjoying going through them and trying new flavors beyond the usual chocolate chip and oatmeal. I recently made some chocolate gingerbread cookies that were amazingly delicious and took them to a party where they were a big hit. Like Therese Huston in the article, I find that making cookies is like an expression of what I feel inside, a little circular externalization of my emotions. They are a great way for me to nonverbally bring a little comfort and happiness to my friends and loved ones. All cooking, I think, is an expression of love for others, but there's just something about baking that really gets to the heart for me, these little sweet bits of love.

Is there a certain food you like to make that encompasses your love for your friends and family, a food that expresses what you feel inside in an edible way?

Zucchini lemon cookies + kitchen sink pasta with zucchini and white wine cream sauce

Hurrah for zucchini! I'm going out of town tomorrow (heading to PA for a week of vacation and going to a friend's wedding), so I wanted to use up the second zucchini from the farmers' market before leaving.

I found this recipe for zucchini lemon cookies that looked really simple--plus I had some lemons at home so I figured, why not? These cookies were pretty easy to put together; the only time-consuming tasks were grating the lemon zest and zucchini, but my microplane and mandolin made easy work of those.

I'd suggest doing the same parchment paper trick when you go to bake these cookies, and putting them in a 375 degree oven won't be a problem. I baked mine for about 13-14 minutes and they came out really well: light brown on the bottom with pale, puffed centers. These cookies are scrumptious... really like soft little tea cakes. They stay very soft and moist, thanks to the zucchini. And speaking of which, they do mostly taste of lemon (there's a lot of zest in there!), but they have a little hint of the zucchini here and there. And they just look beautiful, with the bits of yellow and green speckling the pale rounded surfaces. Highly recommended! I took some to work and they were gobbled up. Everyone was pleasantly surprised by the flavor combo and the softness.

I used the other half of the zucchini with some pasta. We had leftover linguine from our grown-up hamburger helper, and while that cooked I steamed the zucchini (sliced into thin rounds). After the pasta cooked, I melted the bit of butter left over from the cookies and sauteed a clove of garlic with the zucchini. Then I added some dry white wine, a bit of heavy cream, and a grating of fresh parmesan cheese. I threw in a spoonful of flour to thicken the sauce, and added some salt.

Like whoa. For being a meal of leftovers ("kitchen sink" pasta, as Jeremy calls these dishes when we throw together a bunch of stuff with pasta), it was really quite delicious. Anything made with cream is always delicious. When white wine is added, even more so. I was pretty pleased that I found a way to use up a bunch of leftovers in a delicious, make-it-up-as-I-go kind of way.

So I'm off to PA tomorrow! I'm hoping to have lots of foodie adventures while I'm home, so I'll be sure to share as many as I can here. Bon voyage to myself!

Peanut Butter Blossoms recipe, for Melis

This is for Melis.

Peanut Butter Blossoms

This is one of my favorite cookie recipes and one that I used to make all the time as a kid. They are really good, with or without the kiss on top. It's also fun to make them around Valentine's Day using the Dove chocolate hearts. Delicious!

More soup + peanut butter cookies, two ways

A batch of muffins, a pot of soup, and two batches of cookies. Yeah, I spent the weekend in the kitchen.

For soup, I made a variation of Mama Pidal's lentil soup, except using the cleverly packaged Goya 16-bean soup mix. I love bean soups because they are filling and also freeze excellently for future meals. I added the usual mirepoix, plus spinach and two packets of Goya sazon, along with some onion and garlic salts and the requisite salt and pepper. It made a LOT of soup, which is living in a giant pot on my stove top. In my dream world, I would have a giant pot of soup simmering on my stove top every day. One of my favorite smells is the blend of aromatics as they hit the soup pot, before they start cooking. If I could bottle it and sell it, I would. I'd call it Essence of Soup Pot---you could just have the odor of fresh soup pervading your kitchen, whether you were cooking or not. Yum.

Jeremy was an absolute gem today and cleaned the house while I sat on my ass drinking pumpkin spice coffee watching Project Runway on On Demand. So as a reward, I made him not one but two batches of peanut butter cookies. Because why stop at just one peanut-buttery treat? He deserves double the fatty delicious love. I made a batch of peanut butter oatmeal cookies and another of peanut butter molasses. I've made the latter before and brought them to work to share, and they were literally such a hit that the pile of them disappeared in just a couple of hours. I saw that I was on to something really good here, so I think these might be my secret weapon cookie. I feel like I could win wars (and hearts) with these things. (I also feel this way about my red velvet cupcake recipe.) So unfortunately, I'm keeping that recipe to myself.

But fortunately for you, I'm not a total selfish brat, so I do want to share the peanut butter oatmeal recipe with you. These cookies are AMAZING! They are so dense and filling. The recipe author, Nicole Rees, suggests arming yourself with a glass of milk, and I agree. So, make haste! Get thee to the oven and make these cookies. They are scrumptious.

CHEWY PEANUT BUTTER OATMEAL COOKIES - by Nicole Rees

• 3/4 cup oil
• 1/4 cup water
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
• 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
• 1 large egg
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup plus 2 tbsp all-purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 2 1/2 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
• 1 cup raisins or chocolate chips (note: I skipped these and found the cookies perfect without them)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Beat oil, water, and sugars, until smooth. Beat in peanut butter until well combined. Stir in egg, vanilla and salt until smooth and creamy.

Stir in flour and baking soda until almost all combined. Stir in the oats and raisins or chips if you're using. At this point, it will be a workout for your biceps to get a spoon through the dough. Allow the dough to rest at room temperature for 10 minutes.

Line baking sheets with parchment paper.* Drop walnut-sized chunks of dough, about 2 tablespoons, onto baking sheets, spacing at least 1 1/2 inches apart. (I found it easiest to scoop up a glob of dough with a metal dining spoon and then gently shaping it into a ball with my fingers; don't overhandle or the dough will get melty.) These cookies don't spread very much, which is nice

Bake for 13 to 14 minutes, until golden at the edges and puffed in the centers but not quite set. Don't overbake! Allow to cool for 3 minutes on cookie sheet before transferring to wire rack to cool completely.

*Using parchment paper on cookie sheets? A revelation. No need to grease the sheets, which always leads to greasy clean-up later. No burnt bottoms. No cookies sticking to the sheet. All around a fabulous tip. I'll never grease cookie sheets again, and neither should you. Thank you, Nicole Rees.

Yield: dozens of cookies ahead

So when you decide to make cookies, before you do anything else, read the yield.

As in the part of the recipe that tells you how many cookies the batter you make will produce. Because last night I decided to make some cookies (oatmeal with pomegranate jelly) and was halfway through the batter before I noticed this all-important number.

You'd think that after preparing and beginning to make a batter that calls for two sticks of butter and three cups of flour that I'd realize there would be a serious amount of cookies resulting, but no. I thought it was a little odd, but not extraordinary. But then I looked at the yield, after creaming said two sticks of butter into two kinds of sugar: 4 1/2 to 5 dozen cookies.

SIXTY COOKIES? WTF!

In for a penny, in for a pound (of butter, it felt like). So I soldiered on. And the cookies actually turned out really well. Yes, I was in the kitchen for like two hours, but once things turned into an assembly line sort of system, it really wasn't so bad.

Here's something I discovered. I only own two cookie sheets, and for this particular recipe, I could fit 12 cookies on a sheet. So I baked one sheet at a time, and after removing the cookies, I put the hot, empty sheet in the fridge for a few minutes while the second sheet baked. This cooled the sheet to room temperature so that I could add more dough to the sheet. (You should never put raw dough on a hot cookie sheet, because it'll melt the fats in your dough and mess it up.) After refrigerating, I was also able to scrub off any jelly spills with a wet paper towel. This made the baking process go much faster because I didn't have to wait for each sheet to cool for who knows how long before proceeding.

Here's the recipe. It originally called for raspberry preserves, but I had a jar of pomegranate jelly in my kitchen that just wasn't getting used up (it's not terribly compatible with peanut butter), so I used that instead. And please note that it really does make like 60 cookies or so. They are small cookies, and yummy, so that shouldn't be a bad thing.

Oatmeal and Jelly Cookies
4 1/2 to 5 dozen

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup butter (two sticks), softened
1/2 cup water
1 tsp almond extract
2 eggs
3 cups all-purpose/unbleached flour
2 cups quick-cooking rolled oats
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
fruit preserves, jam, or jelly (I really think any flavor will work!)

Heat oven to 400 degrees F.

In a large bowl, beat brown sugar, sugar, and butter until light and fluffy.

Add water, almond extract, and eggs and blend well. The mixture will look curdled and watery.

Stir in the flour, oats, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon and mix well. The mixture will thicken and look lumpy

Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheets. With a spoon, make an imprint in the center of each cookie and fill the imprint with 1/2 teaspoon of preserves. Drop a bit of dough over the preserves on each cookie.

Bake for 6 to 9 minutes until the cookies are a light golden brown. Immediately remove from cookie sheets and allow to cool on a rack.

Baking: the good, the bad, and the buttery

It's been a baking kind of week. Monday was my coworker Rosie's surprise birthday party at work, so I made my now-famous red velvet cupcakes for her party. I don't mind tooting my own horn and saying that they are DELICIOUS! And come on, who doesn't love cream cheese icing? How can one not love an icing that consists of a block of cream cheese, a stick of butter, and cups of powdered sugar? YUM. So those were a big hit. Some people even had seconds. All hail the cupcake queen! I'm actually thinking of making red velvet cupcakes for our Christmas Eve dinner party. How cute would those be for dessert, especially with some nice green sugar sprinkles on top? I also just like the portion control of cupcakes. We have our relatives over for Christmas Eve dinner at my parents' house, and by the time we're all done stuffing ourselves (separate entry on the food tk), most people can't fathom eating a slice of cake for dessert. But there's something about a cupcake that makes it okay to just eat it up. Not to mention that the red, white, and green would be super cute. I've taken to making dessert because my aunt always used to be in charge of making it, and she would make and bring a flan. Now I know there are some people out there who love flan, but I sort of hate it. The texture is just gross. And after eating such a big, heavy dinner, no one really wants this dense, rich piece of custard. So red velvets it will be. I considered making an orange spice cake with a glaze, but honestly, I can't say no to an opportunity to make cupcakes.

Today is a cookie swap at work, and so last night I attempted to make orange cream cheese cookies. I say "attempted" because the whole experience was just sort of a disaster. I decided to make two separate batches, because sometimes doubling a recipe can just be horrific, so here I was thinking I was smart. Turns out, not so much. First I grated off part of my right thumb knuckle while trying to grate some orange zest. So I rinsed off my thumb and tried again on a different part of the grater. And I grated the same spot, AGAIN. After applying a band-aid and then grating the rest of the orange as carefully as possible, I discovered that the recipe called for not one stick of butter, as I'd originally thought, but two. Dear LORD. I'd already had one sitting out for what I thought would be the second batch, so at least it was ready to go, but as I tossed things into the bowl to mix, I realized that these cookies were going to consist of butter and not much else. Don't let the name fool you, friends: there is barely any cream cheese (not even half a block!) and even less orange in these things. They are ALL BUTTER. UGH! Paula Deen would be so proud. Of course I discovered this too late. And the portion of batter I tasted must have been the only spot where orange zest and juice happened to get mixed in, because after I pulled these things out of the oven, they just tasted like butter cookies.

But I'm getting ahead of myself here. Rewind. I finished mixing the decidedly cream-cheese-and-orange-devoid butter batter and doled out one sheet of cookies. Part of the reason I chose to bake these things is because the first time I made them they were delicious, and the other reason is because they only take 10 minutes or less to bake per batch. This short baking time, I figured, would allow me to make the 30 or so cookies in the first batch and then pop in the second batch without ending up going to bed at 1 am. This was my plan. But unfortunately, when I pulled out the first tray, the pot holder somehow slipped out of my left hand and I ended up planting my left thumb DIRECTLY on the burning-hot cookie sheet. Dear GOD, that was painful. So now I was out ANOTHER thumb, and I still had cookies to put in the oven and continue doling out. Thankfully Jeremy came to my rescue. He put the other tray of cookies in the oven, tended to my wounded thumb with a frozen gel pack, and washed the sticky, buttery mess of dishes I'd made. He also removed the first round of cookies from the cookie sheet, washed that, and then (with my expert tutelage) doled out the last of the dough to bake the last of the cookies. All while I moaned and iced my thumb and squeezed aloe gel all over it.

So I ended up with only about 30 cookies, which is less than what I'm supposed to have for the swap, and out two thumbs. There was no way I was going to try and make ANOTHER batch of evil, butter-centric batter while I had one shredded thumb and one burnt one, not to mention the fact that I was going to try and make some lentil soup for dinner. So I ended up with an extra orange, a nearly full carton of orange juice, one and a half packages of cream cheese, and less cookies than I needed, not to mention eating just cereal for dinner.

So I'm sparing everyone by not sharing the recipe for these cookies, because honestly, they are crap. I sort of hate butter cookies, and these hardly taste like anything else. I swear that last time I made them they were so much better. Perhaps it's because then I had a stand mixer at my mom's house and now I only have a hand mixer. It's a decent hand mixer, but it's just not the same as having a stand mixer. Maybe someday, when I have money and counter space, I'll actually have a stand mixer. But until then, I'll just have butter-covered, bandaged thumbs.