a whisk and a spoon

Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Chunkers

Chunkers are basically chocolate held together with more chocolate– awesome! Start with a brownie-like chocolate base, stir in a ton of chopped milk and dark chocolate, as well as dried cherries and cashews, and you get chunky, chewy, gooey globs. I made mine on the small side, but you can go big with them as well. You could mix up the fruit and nuts, too. I can see these taking well to lots of combos. They’re a delicious way to kick off a new year of cookie baking.

Something felt familiar about these cookies, so I reviewed “my files” and discovered that I actually made these before with BCM. That was like, ummm, ten years ago (!)…no wonder my memory was a little fuzzy.

For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and please join us if you haven’t already!

Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Princeton Gingersnaps

I like gingersnap cookies much better than gingerbread cookies. And these Princeton Gingersnaps are a very fine example of a good gingersnap. They have ginger three ways: fresh, crystallized and ground. Because Dorie doesn’t mess around. This dough is a snap (haha) to make as well. It’s all done with a few zaps of the food processor. Roll the dough (after chilling) into balls, dip in sugar and bake. They flatten out and get nice and crackly in the oven. I baked them so they had crispy edges but kept a little chew in the middle. Perfection!

For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and please join us if you haven’t already!

Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Kerrin’s Multigrain Chocolate Chip Cookies

Just when you think you’ve probably made every chocolate chipper out there, along comes another version to try. Kerrin’s Multigrain Chocolate Chip Cookies have a nice amount of whole wheat and buckwheat (in addition to chocolate!) to give them great flavor and chew. The buckwheat here is in the form of both flour and kasha. I love buckwheat pancakes, so I usually have the flour on hand in the fridge, but I don’t have the kasha. I do have a box of something called “cream of buckwheat cereal” and I used that instead. Worked just fine. These cookies get finished with a sprinkle of sea salt (or my favorite Murray River salt from Australia), always a nice touch. They’re winners in my book, and pretty, too, with rich color from the buckwheat flour and crackly tops.

For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. It’s also here. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and please join us if you haven’t already!

Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Crumb-Topped Apple Bars

Well, it’s Halloween night and I’ve just finished handing out eight bags of candy, so I can now concentrate on my delinquent TWD posts. These Crumb-Topped Apple Bars…I made them a few weeks ago, but getting a post up seems more work than baking sometimes…I let it slide. These were delicious, though. Just like apple crumble pie (my favorite variety of apple pie), but easier. The crust and crumb topping are made from the same brown sugar cookie dough. I added rains and walnuts to my apple filling. I made a half batch of the bars, but probably could have done with a full, since I found that they did freeze really well. Ice cream and caramel sauce seemed natural partners for these, but they were also great straight-up.

For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and please join us if you haven’t already!

Tuesdays with Dorie DC: French Snacklettes

Snacklettes– isn’t that the best name for a cookie? These French Snacklettes are little buttery chocolate and almond blobs that are super easily made in a food processor. You can just pinch the dough together into haphazard nugget shapes if you want. I tried to get fancy and made mine into pyramids, like the picture in the book, but they slumped in the oven so they wound up more nugget-like after all. I needn’t have bothered, but no matter. After they cooled, I tasted just a crumb off the sheet tray before packing them up for later, and worried that they weren’t very sweet. But after coming home really late (and more than slightly tipsy) that night, I had a whole one and it was sweet and salty and chocolatey and a little crumbly. So then I ate two more! I had very little willpower at that point in the night, but I have to say, they were even better with coffee the next morning.

For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. It’s also here, as it was Dorie’s Cookies and Kindness recipe last November. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and please join us if you haven’t already!

Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Graham Cracker Cookies

What’s better than a store-bought Graham Cracker Cookie? A homemade one! The dough for these comes together in the food processor, so it’s a snap to make. It’s a little sticky, but if you work with it chilled, it’s no biggie. Cut, docked and sprinkled with cinnamon sugar, the baked cracker-cookies are too good to turn into crumbs. I say schmear them with peanut butter or munch on them with tea. You can see that I didn’t get perfectly squared off corners here, but I ate them first, so you and I are the only ones who know.

For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and please join us if you haven’t already!

Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Two-Bite One-Chip Cookies

Two-Bite One-Chip Cookies…it’s a pretty self-explanatory name, but here’s the deal anyway…take chocolate chip cookies and miniaturize them into two-bite domes of cookie dough, each with a single chocolate chip (or maybe two, if you push the envelope) hidden inside. I’m pretty sure that these little cuties are very kid-friendly, but I know that they are adult-friendly. If you’re the type who has a lot of willpower, then you’ll have one or two of these and the fact that you had a few chocolatey bites will make you satisfied. If you’re the type who doesn’t, then you’ll be popping them into your mouth one after another. I think you can guess which type I am.

For the recipe, see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan. It’s also here, as it was Dorie’s Cookies and Kindness recipe last September. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and please join us if you haven’t already!

Tuesdays with Dorie DC: Crash-O-Cookies

Crash-O-Cookies are the kind of cookie I think pretty much everyone likes…oatmeal with cinnamon, milk chocolate chunks and plumped raisins. And for those who happen to not be crazy about a particular add-in, they can swap it out or leave it out. I actually used dried cherries when I realized I didn’t have any raisins, and think that dark chocolate would be pretty darn good in these next time, too. They were easy to put together. I did forget to flatten my scoops a bit, so my cookies likely baked up a bit more chubby than they would have otherwise, but I think this actually kept them nice and chewy.

In the spirit of #cookiesandkindness, I shared these with a friend who was in from out of town. He always bugs me for treats when he’s around, but I usually show up empty-handed. He liked these so much, that now he’s bugging me for the recipe! I told him he could see Dorie’s Cookies by Dorie Greenspan, but that since it was also Dorie’s #cookiesandkindness selection for the month of July, the Crash-O recipe and backstory is on her site, too. Don’t forget to check out the rest of the TWD Blogroll and please join us if you haven’t already!