For the holiday coming next — yes that'll be twenty ten, I'd like to make these two gorgeous chocolate cookie recipes found on the Thimble blog, so yummy:
Salty Chocolate Shortbread
adapted from Essence of Chocolate by John Scharffenberger and Robert Steinberg
1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1 teaspoon sea salt (I used coarse kosher salt and this seemed to work well also)
12 tablespoons butter, room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.
Mix together the flour and cocoa powder in a bowl and set aside.
In another bowl beat the butter and sugar together for about 5 minutes until light colored and fluffy. Add in the vanilla.
Slowly add half of the flour-chocolate mixture and mix on low speed. Add the rest of the flour and cocoa and mix until just combined. Stir in the salt. The batter should form a kind of doughy ball. If needed, at this point you can refrigerate the dough for up to a week, but no refrigeration is required.
Roll out the dough between two sheets of parchment paper to 1/4-inch thickness. Using cookie cutters or a knife, cut the dough into whatever shape you want. I used a small glass to make circles. Sprinkle a few grains of coarse sea salt on top of the cookies for extra salty deliciousness.
Place the cut-out cookies onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper and bake for 15 minutes, rotating halfway. They should be slightly firm but not hard when done. Let cool on wire racks.
You can store these in an airtight container for up a week. They are nice warm and soft straight from the oven, but also develop a deeper flavour and texture over a few days.
Chocolate Espresso Snowcaps
from Martha Stewart
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
4 teaspoons instant espresso
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
2/3 cup packed light-brown sugar
1 large egg
4 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, melted and cooled
1 tablespoon milk
Confectioners’ sugar, for coating
In a medium bowl, sift together flour, cocoa, espresso, baking powder, and salt. With an electric mixer, cream butter and brown sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in egg until well combined; mix in cooled chocolate. With mixer on low, gradually add flour mixture; beat in milk until just combined. Flatten dough into a disk; wrap in plastic. Freeze until firm, about 45 minutes.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment. Shape dough into 1-inch balls. Pour confectioners’ sugar (about 1/2 cup) into a medium bowl; working in batches, roll balls in sugar two times, letting them sit in sugar between coatings.
Place on prepared baking sheets, 2 inches apart. Bake until cookies have spread and coating is cracked, 12 to 14 minutes; cookies will still be soft to the touch. Cool cookies on a wire rack.
Makes 18
