Chocolate Espresso Cookies from A Farm Girl's Dabbles

Chocolate Espresso Cookies - made dough August 26, 2023 from A Farm Girl's Dabbles 

1 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled

1 1/3 cups granulated sugar

5 tablespoons maple syrup

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour

3 tablespoons cocoa powder

1 teaspoon espresso powder

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

brown or white sugar, for rolling

1. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat together melted butter and granulated sugar until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Add maple syrup, egg and vanilla, beating on medium speed until combined.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, espresso powder, baking powder and salt. Add to butter mixture on low speed in two additions, beating after each addition until just combined. Portion into golf-ball-size dough balls, cover and chill for an hour or longer.
3. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
4. Roll chilled dough balls in brown sugar or granulated sugar, coating completely. Evenly space on baking sheets, leaving 2 inches apart.
5. Bake 9-11 minutes or until tops are puffed and cracked. Remove from oven and let cool on baking sheets.

At first glance (and second and third), you can tell this was a cookie fail. The cookies spread too much and are misshapen because they baked right into each other as they spread. From their appearance, you can immediately tell there isn't enough flour.

But what I'm not sure of is whether the recipe doesn't call for enough flour or if I simply didn't add the right amount it called for. When I make cookie dough, I typically whisk the dry ingredients together in a bowl as part of my mise en place. But since I'd been going through a period of flat cookies, I've taken to going by appearance of the dough. Sometimes that calls for withholding some flour and other times for adding more. But when you combine all the dry ingredients together in one bowl, you can't as easily withhold the flour since it's all mixed in with the leavenings and salt.

So my seemingly brilliant solution is to mix all the dry ingredients except the last 1/4-1/2 cup of flour, to be added at the end only if the dough seems sticky and needs more flour. Good idea, right? Welp, it is if you don't forget to add the flour you originally withheld. My problem with this one is I genuinely can't tell you if I did withhold the flour and forgot to add all of it in or if I did measure correctly and the recipe just needs more flour. Mine looks nothing like they're supposed to from A Farm Girl Dabble's blog. Her cookies look perfect. Mine, not so much. 

The first bakes are pictured above, all baked from frozen dough. Fortunately, with the remaining (frozen) cookie dough balls (pictured below), I tried the trick of rounding the cookies with a large round cookie cutter as soon as they came out of the oven so the edges smooth out into the circular shape the cookies are supposed to be. Wow, it actually worked. Except for the one below in the top left. That was my trial run and I didn't quite get all the edges inside the cookie cutter when I was swirling. But hey. it worked on the other ones. Believe it or not, the ones below came out of the oven almost as rough looking and misshapen as the ones above. But capturing each misshapen cookie inside a larger round cookie cutter and swirling immediately after you take them out of the oven while they're still hot got them into shape.

From a flavor perspective, the chocolate and espresso weren't particularly strong. Instead the butter and greasy texture (due to not having enough flour) took over the flavor profile and texture. It wasn't bad but I think it could've been better. Next time I need to pay more attention and make sure I add the right amount of flour. 

Milk Chocolate Macadamia Coconut Cookies by Modern Honey

Milk Chocolate Macadamia Coconut Cookies - made dough August 19, 2023 from Modern Honey

1 cup butter, cut into cubes

1 cup brown sugar, packed 

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla 

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon cornstarch

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 teaspoon salt

2 cups milk chocolate chips

1 cup sweetened flaked coconut

1 cup macadamia nuts, roughly chopped

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper
2. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes.
3. Add eggs, one at a time, then vanilla, mixing to combine after each addition.
4. On low speed, mix in flour, cornstarch, baking soda and salt in two to three additions, mixing just until combined. Do not overmix. 
5. Stir in chocolate chips, coconut and macadamia nuts. Portion dough into golf-ball size balls and flatten tops slightly. Evenly space on lined baking sheets. Bake 9-10 minutes or until edges are golden brown and middles no longer look raw. Remove from oven and let rest on baking sheets for 10 minutes before transferring to wire rack to cool completely.

I must be on a roll with putting nuts in cookies. But I've long ago made an exception to macadamia nuts since they don't soften in baking like their other nutty (bad pun woefully intended) counterparts. Once they cool, they're as crisp as ever.

I typically pair macadamia nuts with coconut or white chocolate or both. This recipe swaps out the white chocolate for milk chocolate. I'm running out of good quality white chocolate chunks and haven't replenished my supply yet so using milk chocolate chunks was ideal. For milk chocolate, I prefer to buy Trader Joe's Pound Plus milk chocolate bar and cut it into chunks for cookies. They taste and look better than going with chocolate chips.

I liked this cookie. It's got a little more going on than a straightforward milk chocolate chip cookie because of the macadamia nuts and coconut so the purist in me had to adapt. But I like macadamia nuts, coconut and milk chocolate separately and they worked together in this cookie. They also didn't spread much, something I always look for in a good cookie.

The edges were crisp and the coconut adds a little more of that crisp-chewy texture as well as sweetness. You can sub out semisweet chocolate chunks or chips for the milk chocolate if you prefer more chocolate and less sugar (that's not me).

Maple Pecan Oatmeal Cookies from Foodtasia

Maple Pecan Oatmeal Cookies - made dough August 26, 2023, modified from Foodtasia 

1 1/2 cups old-fashioned oats

1 1/3 cups (212 grams) all-purpose flour 

1/2 cup (37 grams) shredded, sweetened coconut

1 cup (240 grams) light brown sugar, packed

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 cup butter

5 tablespoons maple syrup

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 tablespoons boiling water

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup pecans, chopped and lightly toasted

1 large egg if mixture is too dry

1. Combine oats, flour, coconut, brown sugar, salt and cinnamon in a large bowl.
2. In a small saucepan, melt and brown the butter. Transfer to a small bowl and whisk in maple syrup.
3. In a small bowl, whisk baking soda into boiling water and add the butter mixture. Stir in vanilla. Pour into oat-flour mixture and mix to combine. Fold in pecans. If mixture is too dry and doesn't come together, beat in 1 egg.
4. Portion dough into golf-ball size dough balls. Flatten into thick discs. Cover and chill or freeze for several hours or overnight.
5. When ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper and evenly space dough discs.
6. Bake 12-16 minutes or until edges are set and middles no longer look raw. Remove from heat and let rest on baking sheets for several minutes. Transfer to wire rack to cool completely.

Okay, back to the cookies I've been baking for care packages for Soldiers Angels. If you've read my blog for any length of time, you know I'm against nuts in cookies. They steam and soften during baking and interfere with the texture of a cookie. With the rare exception of macadamia nuts in a macadamia white chocolate and/or coconut cookie, I just don't like nuts in my cookies.

But, since the world doesn't revolve around me (damn), I followed this recipe faithfully to include the pecans. And....I have to say they worked. I think it's partly because this cookie has so many other ingredients to add to the texture, like the oats and the coconut, that the nuts didn't interfere with the texture so much as add to it.

These were little bites of goodness that almost seemed healthy if you ignore the butter, flour, and sugar. One important note: the original recipe did not include eggs. But when I mixed the recipe as is from Foodtasia's blog, the mixture was too dry. Having had bad failures with too dry cookies, especially when oats were involved, I added a large egg to bind the mixture together. Otherwise it was too crumbly and I knew they wouldn't bake properly.

It's a good thing I did as you can see the results here. The cookies didn't spread much (not enough moisture) so shape them in the shape and thickness you want them to be when forming the dough balls/discs. If you want thinner cookies with more spread and your dough seems too dry, add another egg or enough egg white to get the dough consistency you want.

Crumbl Cookies review #52 - Chocolate Cupcake

Crumbl Cookies review #52 - Chocolate Cupcake, visited September 13, 2023

Chocolate Cupcake

It only took 4 posts in the same week but with this post, I'm finally able to publish a review the same week the cookie is still available. #goalunlocked

bad angle as someone was standing partially in front of it when I took the picture

I've not been super thrilled with the Crumbl cookie offerings of late. As evidenced by me getting one cookie at a time or per week. Which isn't a bad thing, says my waistline.

I had been planning to skip this week but, believe it not, I was actually out of Crumbl cookie pieces in my freezer. When I can't (and don't) eat the cookies all at once, I break them into 1/3 or 1/4 pieces, wrap each piece and place them in my freezer. Then I take out a piece (sometimes 2) a day and eat them as an after-lunch dessert. But because the flavors haven't appealed lately and I've been buying single cookies rather than 4-packs, I ran out of cookie pieces. #horror So I decided to try the Chocolate Cupcake cookie.

Since I do like their vanilla cookies, I liked this one as it's essentially a vanilla cookie with chocolate frosting. The cookie texture is between a shortbread but not as dry and their regular cookie but not as fluffy. It was pretty good and I liked it. The chocolate frosting does overwhelm the vanilla flavor though so this cookie isn't for the vanilla purists. If you like the tub of chocolate frosting you can buy at the grocery store, you'll like this frosting. Normally I'm not a frosting person and I'm a huge frosting snob because I'm not big on frosting in the first place so it has to be worth it for me to like it. But I have to admit, this frosting was reminiscent of my childhood days, when, if my mom bought frosting at all for a made-from-box-mix cake for birthday cakes, it was more of a sentimental pleasure than a please-my-snobby-taste-buds pleasure. Not sure I'd get this again but if I needed a cookie and I didn't like anything else in the weekly lineup, then yeah, I probably would.

Crumbl Cookies review #51 - Caramel Pumpkin Cake

Crumbl Cookies review #51 - Caramel Pumpkin Cake, visited September 6, 2023

I'm trying to get caught up in my Crumbl reviews so I'm knocking these out one after the other. This (now last) week's menu didn't really interest me. I've already tried the Key Lime Pie and the Chocolate Toffee Cake, neither of which I liked enough to get again.

Crumbl's chocolate cookies are too rich for me and I prefer their milk chocolate chip cookie over the semisweet so that knocked out the other three cookies, leaving only the Caramel Pumpkin Cake. 

I have mixed feelings about this cake. Because cake is what it is. It's simply not a cookie. It wasn't even a cakey cookie. It really was a cake in a puffy disc form. Other people raved about it but I'm not one of them.

I think it's a matter of expectations. If you expect to go into Crumbl Cookies and get a bready cake, your expectations are met or even exceeded with this not-a-cookie. If you go in expecting a cookie, sorry, you're out of luck with this one.

I don't mind pumpkin and the flavor was fine, very similar to their carrot cake cookie, which I do like, but this wasn't a pumpkin cake cookie. It was pumpkin cake. Pass on this next time unless they make it more cookie and less cake. Or unless I want a bready pumpkin muffin with cream cheese frosting.

Crumbl Cookies review #50 - Cookie Butter Lava

Crumbl Cookies review #50 - Cookie Butter Lava, visited September 2, 2023

In the same week I got the cannoli test cookie, I went back a few days later to get the cookie butter lava cookie. 

When I lived in Vegas, I learned to be skeptical of Crumbl's filled cookies as none of those stores ever did it well. The filling would bake into the cookie (or so I was told) and not be found, they'd be missed entirely and literally wasn't there to be found or there was such little filling placed inside that it didn't even constitute filling. More like a swirl into the cookie.

But here's where the Sparks, NV store shines once again and I always have to give them props. They know how to make filled cookies correctly and in the right amounts so there are no excuses about too little or nonexistent filling baking into the cookie. The filled cookies are filled. 

This was really good, just the right amount of crisp at the edges and the gooeyness in the middle. It's a messy cookie to eat because the glaze drizzled over the top of the cookie hasn't set if you eat it warm (which I did - the taste piece anyway). But sacrifices must be made and a messy eating experience is worth it for an excellent cookie.

Crumbl Cookies review #49 - Cannoli Cookie (test cookie)

Crumbl Cookies review #49 - Cannoli Cookie (test cookie), visited August 30, 2023

I've gotten into the habit of going to my local Crumbl store on Wednesdays so I can wait for the test cookie and decide if I want it or any other flavor on the menu that week. Although this particular week I wanted the snickerdoodle cupcake and the cookie butter lava as well as the test cookie, I decided against upgrading to a 4-pack and getting them all at once. One of the appeals of Crumbl cookies is having a warm cookie when you buy it. Except I couldn't eat 2 warm cookies and a chilled one in one sitting so for this trip, I only got the test cookie.

There were 3 test cookies on offer at various Crumbl test stores across the country. After looking at the possible flavors, I'm glad my store decided to test the cannoli. I'm actually not a big cannoli fan. I don't mind the crisp tube of pastry shell but I don't like ricotta in a dessert (sorry but it only belongs in lasagna!). But since was supposedly only "cannoli-inspired", I decided to try it.

The cookie is served chilled but of course I let it come to room temperature first since I don't like chilled cookies. At room temp, the cookies are really soft so handle with care. Otherwise, this was fantastic. Loved the cookie and even liked the filling. If it has ricotta in it, you can't taste it. It's more like a lightly sweetened vanilla custard filling, not a ricotta one. The texture is heavier than whipped cream (I don't like whipped cream either) but not as heavy as custard. It's hard to describe other than it's really good.

I haven't always liked the test cookies even though I'm most interested in trying them. Some I'm glad I tried it as a tester but wouldn't get again, others I would get once it hits the regular lineup and still others I would get multiples of once it's released onto the regular menu. This cannoli cookie? It's the only one I've tried so far that I would get multiples of when it's offered in the normal rotation. Yup, it was that good.