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Need to warm up? These chewy Dark Chocolate Chipotle Cookies will certainly help. The wonderful dark chocolate taste comes through first, followed closely by the kick of the chipotle. Such a great flavor combination!

The recipe originally comes from Nantucket Cookie Company via the Food Network and it is the January Cookie Carnival recipe. I halved the quanity mainly because I just couldn’t bring myself to use 4 sticks of butter. I tried, I just couldn’t do it. In the end, my hips thank me, I’m sure of it.

The recipe calls for crushed dried chipotle peppers but my grocery store was out (and has been for a while) so I substituted with ground chipotle powder. Being cautious because I didn’t want to make them too spicy, I started with 1/8 tsp and worked up from there, according to taste. The final amount I used was somewhere between 1/2 tsp and 1 tsp. Really accurate, I know. After tasting the cookies, I do think I could have added even more. The taste was very subtle but it added a lot to the overall flavor of the cookies. I plan on trying these again when my grocery store gets the crushed dried peppers in stock.

I recommend trying these warm, right out of the oven, with a glass of milk or some hot chocolate!!

Dark Chocolate Chipotle Cookies
adapted from Food Network (Courtesy of Nantucket Cookie Company)

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch cubes, softened
1 cup packed light brown sugar
3/4 cup sugar, plus 1/4 for topping
1/4 cup cocoa powder sifted
1 teaspoon crushed, dried chipotle peppers (or Ground Chipotle Chili powder)
2 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 teaspoons water
4 oz (0.25 lb) high-quality bittersweet chocolate, melted and cooled slightly
3/4 cup high-quality bittersweet chocolate chips, plus 1/4 cup for topping

Mix together the flour, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl; set aside.

With an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter until smooth, scraping sides of the bowl as necessary. Add the sugars, sifted cocoa powder and chipotle peppers and mix at medium speed until light and fluffy (about 1 minute). Add eggs, vanilla and water. Beat at medium speed until combined, about 30 seconds. Add the slightly cooled melted chocolate and mix again, scraping the bowl to evenly mix everything.

Add the flour mixture, and mix until well incorporated. Add the chocolate chips and mix briefly (about 5 seconds).

Refrigerate the dough in the bowl until cool and fudge-like, but not solid, for approximately 1 hour. You can use an ice cream scoop to create large, even sized cookies. These cookie-dough balls can also be frozen at this point, and baked right from the freezer whenever the need arises.

When ready to bake, press the tops of the cookie dough-balls into the sugar, and then top with 2 to 3 pieces of dark chocolate chips. Place onto parchment-lined baking sheets, allowing space for the cookies to spread (Note: I did about 4-6 cookies per sheet because they spread out quite a bit). Bake for 12 to 14 minutes. Remove the cookies from the oven when they are still a little underdone. Slide the parchment paper with the cookies onto a cooling rack and allow to cool before removing from parchment.

Made about 2 dozen large cookies.

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You know those days where you just need a cookie? Yeah, today was one of those days for me. Naturally the cookie had to include chocolate. I quickly decided on Chocolate and Vanilla Moonstones from Carole Walter’s Great Cookies. Chocolate and vanilla in one cookie? How could I pass it up?

The verdict? Yum. That pretty much sums it up.

I assumed they would be the texture of a sugar cookie, but was pleasantly surprised with a more of a soft, “cakey” cookie. The chocolate flavor wasn’t as sweet as it could be, so next time, in place of the unsweetened chocolate, I will try bittersweet to give it a bit more of a chocolate kick.

You could even tint the dough with vegetable coloring to make all sorts of pretty cookies for any occasion. Holidays, parties, Mondays, you name it!

Chocolate and Vanilla Moonstones
adapted from Great Cookies

2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, slightly firm
1 cup superfine sugar
1 egg
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
3 teaspoons hot water, divided
2 tablespoons granulated sugar

Preheat oven to 375°F. Prepare the cookie sheets by moderately buttering.

In a small bowl, melt the chocolate over hot water. Keep warm.

Sift together the flour, salt, baking soda and cream of tartar. Set aside.

Place the butter in a large mixing bowl (or stand mixer bowl, fitted with paddle attachment) and mix on medium-low speed until smooth. Add the superfine sugar and mix until well blended, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Add the vanilla and egg and mix until just barely blended.

Reduce the mixer speed to low; add in half of the flour mixture with 2 teaspoons of the hot water. Stop and scrape bowl then add in the remaining flour mixture, mixing until just barely combined.

Measure out about one-third (about 1 cup) of the dough and place it in a separate bowl. With a fork, blend in the remaining 1 teaspoon of hot water. Add the warm melted chocolate and blend until it is fully incorporated with the dough. Let the batter sit for 10 minutes to thicken. The consistency should be similar to the vanilla batter.

Scoop 1/2 teaspoon of each batter and place one on top of the other on the cookie sheet.

Roll each mound of dough into a uniform ball shape and space about 2 inches apart. Just a note, I had to wipe my hands between rolling every couple of cookies because the chocolate residue on my hands was coloring the vanilla dough.

Place the 2 tablespoons of sugar in a flat dish. Dip the heel of your hand into the sugar and flatten the dough into 2 1/2-inch round disks.

Bake for 9 to 11 minutes or until the edges just start to brown. Let the cookies stand on the sheets for a few minutes, then transfer them to a wire rack to cool. Makes about 4 dozen 3-inch cookies.

They can be stored for up to 2 weeks in an airtight container, layered between strips of wax paper.

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This months Cookie Carnival recipe is Chocolate Citrus Biscotti (flavored with orange and lemon zest) from Giada De Laurentiis via the Food Network.

I love anything citrus. I can eat all the navel oranges you can put in front of me. In my opinion, Florida grows the best oranges. Of course, I may be a bit biased as I grew up in the middle of a county that is home to approximately 95,050 acres of commercial orange groves. In case you were wondering, that’s a ton of oranges!

Back to the biscotti… This is a recipe I plan on baking again and again. It was absolutely wonderful. I loved the cornmeal texture. It’s something I hadn’t tried before with biscotti. It got even better when dipped in hot coffee. Y-u-m-m-y.

I had my doubts that it would be citrus-y enough for my liking, but I was pleasantly surprised with the flavor. It was just right and they smelled absolutely wonderful as they baked!

A couple of notes:

I found the dough to be really soft when trying to form it into logs. It kept wanting to spread outward. In the end, I had more of a large rectangle rather than a well formed log. It still worked though, they were just a little wider than originally intended.

The recipe says it makes 3 dozen. Somehow, I only came out with about 1 dozen. Probably due to the aforementioned widening of the logs.

On the last round of baking I cut the baking time to 20 minutes instead of 25.

Also, there are a few reviews on Food Network’s site saying the biscotti was extremely hard. I didn’t find it to be that hard. Yes, it was a bit harder than some biscotti I have baked but it wasn’t break-your-teeth hard.

For an extra touch, I chopped some walnuts and sprinkled them on the chocolate before it set.

They are even delicious for breakfast. Not that I had any for breakfast. This is just hypothetically speaking of course….sort of….

Get the recipe: Chocolate Citrus Biscotti

Also, if you haven’t already, check out the Cookie Carnival!

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After reading Great Cookies cover to cover, I finally settled which cookie to bake first. It was tough, I’m not gonna lie. There are so many great recipes to choose from. The spanish peanut saucers just looked so wonderfully delicious!

I’ve never been a huge peanut butter cookie fan but after baking these, I’m having second thoughts. Sometimes I find peanut butter cookies can tend to be dry (am I the only one that thinks that?). Thankfully these were really moist and soft. The addition of chopped spanish peanuts in the dough and sugar-crusted whole Spanish peanuts on top really adds a nice texture to them.

This picture is slightly deceiving… these things are huge, measuring in at about 4″ across! Which makes sense as to why they were in the “Big Boys” chapter of the cookbook. I think that’s my favorite chapter so far. Great cookies, page after page.

Did you know it’s National Cookie Month? It’s also National Popcorn Poppin’ Month, Celebrate Sun Dried Tomatoes Month, National Pickled Peppers Month and my personal favorite, National Toilet Tank Repair Month. Just in case you were wondering. Hey, you never know when you might need to know this stuff.

Spanish Peanut Saucers
adapted from Great Cookies: Secrets to Sensational Sweets

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This is my first Cookie Carnival recipe! Yummy Black-Bottom Coconut Bars.

I stumbled upon the Cookie Carnival recently and I had to join immediately because as we all know, I love a good cookie. Well, any cookie really. Plus, I figured it would give me a good chance to broaden my cookie horizons and try recipes from different cookbooks/sources.

Lately I’ve kinda been stuck in a Martha Stewart rut. I have both her cookie and cupcake books, which are both completely fabulous, but I find myself turning to them over and over again. So, when I learned the recipe for this months Cookie Carnival, wouldn’t it just figure it’s a Martha recipe. That’s okay though. I’m not complaining one little bit. I think Martha is just super. I’m just not sure how she feels about me though. Or if she knows I exist… which I’m 99% sure she doesn’t. Okay, okay, moving on.

Out of my entire family, only one other person (besides myself) likes coconut. Isn’t that sad? So for this recipe, they’re just out of luck! Which means I get half of the yummy bars to myself. Yay for me, not so much for my waistline.

The bars were great!. They were really great! They made me realize that I don’t bake with coconut enough. I will have to fix that. Soon.

The recipe is relatively simple. No mixers or fancy gadgets, just bowls and a whisk.

Get the recipe here.

If you haven’t already, check out the Cookie Carnival.

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Slowly but surely I have been baking my way through Martha Stewart’s Cookies book. When I have a cookie craving, this is the book I turn to. So the other night when I was in the baking mood I flipped through and waited for something to jump out at me. Figuratively speaking, of course.

I’ve made plain biscotti before, so this time around, I wanted to try something new. This might just become a favorite from now on. It has several things going for it. Firstly, it’s chocolate. Enough said. But also, the slightly salty taste of the pistachios pairs perfectly with just the right amount of sweetness. In other words, this biscotti rocks!

Whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt, set aside. Beat sugar and butter; add eggs. Lightly beat in flour mixture.

Mmmmm… Look at the chocolaty goodness. Can it get any better?!?!

Oh yeah, it can! Just throw in some semi-sweet chocolate chips and pistachios!

Form the stiff dough into a flattened log and bake for about 25 minutes. Cool a bit then cut diagonally across to form 1-inch-thick slices; place them cut sides down on the cookie sheet. Then, just pop ‘em back in the oven for 8 min. Voilà!

Also, try dipping them in your favorite beverage. Coffee, tea, hot chocolate, you name it!

Chocolate Pistachio Biscotti
adapted from Martha Stewart’s Cookies (pg 246)

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