Awhile back, our friends in Knoxville gave us a cocoa pot, complete with a fitted battery powered mixer. The idea being to toss in the cocoa powder,
pour in the milk and then zap it with the mixer before and after heating
it all in the microwave. It works.
It was 8 above Saturday morning, so I poked about in the pantry for some cocoa powder to make hot cocoa for breakfast as fortification against the record low temperature. I found a box of Dutch cocoa, by Droste, which proved to be high quality stuff. On the back of the box was a recipe for Cracked Chocolate Cookies. Since TLW ordered cookies for the inauguration, these looked promising. Though the recipe called for vegetable oil, it otherwise made culinary sense. Dusted with 10X sugar, the cookies appear cracked as they expand in the oven. The Droste cocoa and brown sugar combine to produce a cookie with an intense chocolate taste with low sugar notes.
So here it is, completely rewritten and with butter and some pecans:
Cracked Chocolate Cookies
See Abbreviations, if needed
Yield: about 30 cookies
1 1/2 C AP flour, sifted once
1/2 t salt
1/2 t baking
soda
6 T
(3/4 stick) butter, softened
1 1/4 C light brown sugar
1/2t
vanilla extract
2
eggs
1/3 C cocoa powder
1/2 C pecans, chopped
1 C
10X sugar for dusting
1. Preheat oven to 375F
2. Add salt and baking soda to the AP flour, sift
and set aside
3. Place butter in KA bowl and spin at high speed
to aerate
4. Slow paddle speed and add the brown sugar and
mix well
5. Add the vanilla extract, eggs and cocoa powder
and mix slowly
6. Add flour mixture slowly and mix until the dough
is all brown again
7. Add the pecans and mix briefly
8. Remove KA bowl from machine, remove and clean
paddle and then
place bowl in fridge while prepping
the next steps
9. Place 10X sugar in a shallow flat tray
10. Place baking mat(s) on cookie
sheet(s)
11. Remove cookie dough from the fridge
12. Scoop out a one-ounce portion of dough with a #60 scoop or
tablespoon,
shape into a ball and drop into
the 10X tray
13. Roll to cover balls with sugar and then place them on cookie
sheet
14. Bake about 9 minutes until cookies are lightly firm to the
touch (about 190F interior)
15. Remove cookies to a rack to cool.
