Cookie Extravaganza! Chocolate-Peppermint Cookies

It's 10 PM and the snow is finally starting to taper off. We've hit a solid 18" and possibly more like 19", but we didn't really want to bundle up again to find out for sure. But thats a full 2 farm animals of snow! Impressive showing. Although the snow may be slowing down, the cookies are still coming along! Up next is Chocolate-Peppermint Cookies. This is a recipe we saw on Martha's homepage and knew we had to make. So here it is.

ingredients

1 c flour

1/2 unsweetened dutch process cocoa powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

5 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened

3/4 c sugar

1 egg

1 egg yolk

3/4 tsp peppermint extract

8 large candy canes

2 lbs white chocolate

instructions

1. whisk together flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.

2. cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

3. add egg, then egg yolk, the peppermint extract

4. add flour mixture, in batches.

5. when everything has been incorporated, wrap in plastic and refrigerate until firm, about an hour.

And once again, we'll be back with the remainder of this one!

6. roll out the dough to 1/8" thickness on a lightly floured piece of parchment. freeze 15 minutes.

7. preheat oven to 350.

8. cut out 2" circles from the dough and put on parchment lined baking sheet. freeze 15 minutes. (repeat for each package of dough)

9. bake about 12 minutes. cool completely.

10. prepare the decorations. melt white chocolate in double boiler or microwave.

Cal's tip: it is very easy to overcook or otherwise mess up melting chocolate. we know this because we weren't paying attention and thought we killed it. but then we learned a trick and saved it with shortening! check out this site if you find yourself in chocolate trouble.

crush candy canes.

11. dunk cookies into chocolate, scrape their bottoms with a knife. sprinkle with candy cane. refrigerate on parchment lined baking sheet until set, about 3 hours.

Cal's tip: We used tongs to dip the chocolate and then a butter knife to scrape the bottoms. There are no pictures because this was a fairly messy process.

These cookies are another new favorite! They took a lot of effort but they are really yummy. They remind us of those winter, white chocolate dipped oreos.

Moo!