I’m going to be sporadically posting recipes from my old blog. I figured, why not start with a great Halloween treat? Enjoy.
There are a few things in this world that are wonderful enough to justify an unconditional love from yours truly. In no particular order they are as follows: my family, butter, licorice, rain, a warm bed, my dog, my roommates, sugar, books, high heels, New England and my CU Independent new section.
Last week I had the divine pleasure of combining a few of these things into one big, warm, lovey-dovey display of my affection– black and white cookies.
The black and white cookie (for those of you who have yet to taste its sweet perfection) is my kind of dessert. Part cookie, part cake and a whole lot of sugar and butter make these treats one of my favorite.
With a fall potluck (hence and orange and black frosting) with my news team, family weekend a day later and Halloween right around the corner I decided to bake something from the heart.
Now, as some of you may know, most of my recipes I try to “healthify” a bit with some substitutions to make my desserts a bit friendlier to one’s body, but sometimes people, you just need to say, “to heck with it!” and make that full fat, all sugar, all decadent cookie and enjoy it! So that’s what I did with this recipe. And let me tell you…I knew they were going to be a hit the minute I had my dough ready to go. Seriously, this is probably some of the best dough I have ever tasted in my life. I couldn’t stop eating it! A full half a cup of raw, uncooked dough managed to find its way into my belly.
The end result was just as heavenly with a lovely moist cookie covered with a professional looking frosting glaze that tasted even better after a day or two of just sitting out.
So whip out those sticks of butter, throw in an extra little bit of sugar and a whole lot of love, and whip up a big batch of these cookies just in time for the holiday spirit that’s settling in.
Recipe adapted from Joy the Baker.
I was cooking for quite a few people so my recipe yields around 35 cookies. If this is too much, just cut the recipe in half.
Cookies:
5 cups flour (I used a half white all-purpose and half wheat blend)
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp salt
1 1/3 cups buttermilk
2 1/2 tsp vanilla
1 1/3 cups unsalted butter, softened
2 cups sugar
3 large eggs
1 egg white
Frosting:
Vanilla
2 cups confectioners sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup boiling water
Food coloring (if desired)
Chocolate
2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips (melted)
3 Tbls confectioners sugar
1/2 cup boiling water
Preheat over to 350 degrees.
Make a dry mixture with the flour, baking soda and salt, set aside.
Use the buttermilk and vanilla to make a wet mixture and set that aside as well.
Beat together butter and sugar until well incorporated with few lumps and a white color.
Add eggs all at once and combine well.
Beginning and ending with the dry mixture, alternatively beat in the dry and wet mixes at small amounts at a time.
Grease cookie sheets with cooking spray. Add 1/4 cups of batter to the sheets about 2 inches apart. Make sure you keep them at least this far apart! These cookies expand A LOT more then you would think!
They weren’t even done rising at this point if you can believe it.
Bake in the middle of the oven until tops are barely golden and the cookies spring back when you gently touch them with a finger. For me, this was about 11-14 minutes.
Remove from cookie sheet to a wire rack and cool completely before frosting. Chill in the refrigerator if necessary.
While your cookies are baking and cooling make your glazes.
Boil the water. I kept adding more water and had a pot of it constantly boiling because I found that the vanilla glaze in particular gets a bit thick after it cool down and you will want to keep it from hardening before you frost the cookies.
For the vanilla glaze, mix together the vanilla and sugar in a small bowl. Add tablespoons of boiling water until a smooth paste forms. I added a few drops of yellow and red food coloring to make mine a bit more festive. Feel free to leave this out or make our own fun frosting color.
Frost one half of the cookies with this frosting.
For the chocolate frosting, melt the chocolate chips in a small bowl. I used a microwave and nuked the chips for 30 seconds and then ten additional seconds until it was fully melter. Be careful with the time, you don’t want to heat it too long and burn the chocolate.
Add powdered sugar and boiling water one tablespoon at a time until you have a nice, smooth chocolate glaze.
Frost the other half of the cookie with this frosting.
Chill cookies in the fridge until the frosting sets, around 20 minutes or so.
If you want to keep these cookies for a few extra days (or give them away as treats to your loved ones as I did) wrap them individually in clear plastic wrap to preserve freshness and make handling more sanitary.
