Cookies
Mini Pink Ombre Sugar Cookie Cake
October 16, 2012 | 
Author October usually makes me think of the colors black and orange, fall leaves, pumpkins, and football. However, this month is devoted to something even greater – Breast Cancer Awareness. It is difficult to find someone who has not been touched by this disease themselves or indirectly through family and loved ones. I have had a few friend’s mothers and family friends diagnosed with it, of whom two unfortunately have passed away. According to BreastCancer.Org 1 in 8 women will develop breast cancer in their life. About 85% of women diagnosed with breast cancer have no family history of the disease. A fact that shocked me, because here I was thinking I was okay due to the lac of it in my family. Start becoming familiar with self exams ladies!
To promote awareness, Erin from Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts and Cassie from Bake Your Day teamed up this week with a group of other bloggers to bring you a full week of pink recipes, or recipes that are helpful in fighting cancer. Each day at the bottom of our posts you will see links to the other blogs who are helping us raise awareness. Check out what they make and the end of the week there will be a giveaway!
For contribution to Breast Cancer Awareness week, I made a mini cookie cake dyed to be pink ombre. Even though there is nothing in this cookie cake that helps fight breast cancer, it sure looks breast-cancer-aware dressed up in it’s pinkness! You can have this cookie cake all to yourself, or share it with someone special in your life.
MINI PINK OMBRE SUGAR COOKIE CAKE
Makes 1 cake, or five cookies
Ingredients:
2 Tbsp unsalted butter, room temperature
4 Tbsp sugar
2 Tbsp beaten egg
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
6 Tbsp all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
Pink food coloring
Favorite frosting and sprinkles
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a small cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- In a medium-sized mixing bowl, stir the butter and sugar together until creamed. Add the egg and vanilla and mix.
- Stir in flour, baking soda, salt cream of tarter and stir until fully incorporated.
- Divide dough into 5 equal parts, and add food coloring r=to each in a gradient.
- Place the dough balls on prepared cookie sheet 2 inches apart and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
- Bake for 8-10 minutes, until the edges are browned. Cool completely on a wire rack before frosting.
- Once cookies are cooled, start with the darkest cookie and alternate layers of cookie and frosting to create a mini cookie cake.
- Top with a final layer of frosting, sprinkles and enjoy!
Source: Adapted slightly from Bake Your Day.
Review: Wilton’s Linzer Cookie Cutter Sets and Fall Sprinkles
I don’t mean to place any bias, but I really enjoy Wilton products. I’ve already been using their products for years, but after my delightful experience with their cake icing smoothers I became much more dedicated. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that when the next item to review showed up in my mailbox, there was no doubt that I needed to try it out. Especially since this time it involved festive sprinlkes!! Wilton generously sent me a round linzer and square linzer cookie cutter set (each complete with 6 interchangeable center cutout shapes that allow your filling of choice to shine through), as well as their leaves sprinkles, leaves mix sprinkles and fall sprinkle assortment.
The cookie cutters worked great, just be sure to dip them in flour after a few cookies so that the dough doesn’t stick to the edges. By dipping in flour I also rarely had to use the red plunger to remove the dough. Just don’t forget to keep track of how many you’ve cut with the middles punched out, and then you can easily slide out the midde-cutter to cut out some bottoms. I really enjoyed the different choices for the middle shapes. Great for all kinds of holidays!
Even though the linzer cookies I have come across are usually sprinkled with powdered sugar, I decided to change it up and use their fall colored sprinkles. I used to love decorating cookies for the holidays growing up, so using those sprinkles definitely brought back fond memories in my parents’ kitchen. Next I plan to use their super cute micro leaves sprinkles on some truffles!
For the insides I used a chocolate-hazelnut praline filling. Did you know that when you add chocolate to hazelnut praline paste, it’s basically becomes a fancier version of Nutella? What I am trying to say here is that you can use the hazelnut praline paste I shared with you yesterday to make these cookies. Or you can just use Nutella, or just go ahead and use your favorite jam (I bet a cinnamon apple would be wonderful).
One year ago: Taco Bowls
LINZER COOKIES
Makes approximately 5 dozen filled cookies
Ingredients:
COOKIES
1 cup unsalted butter
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup confectioners’ sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup almond flour
2-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 egg
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting (or festive sprinkles)
CHOCOLATE PRALINE FILLING
1/2 cup hazelnut praline paste
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
Directions:
- To make the cookies: Beat together the butter, sugars, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and vanilla.
- Mix in the nut flour, flour, and egg.
- Divide the dough in half, wrap, and refrigerate for 60 minutes, for easiest rolling. Towards the end of the chilling time, preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
- Roll the dough 1/8″ thick. Cut the dough into shapes with large linzer cutters. Use small cutters to cut a design out of the center of half the cookies.
- Transfer the cookies to an ungreased or parchment-lined baking sheet. If using sprinkles, top cookies here before baking.
- Bake for 8 to 10 minutes, until lightly browned on the edges. Remove from the oven, and cool on a rack. While the cookies are cooling, make the filling.
- To make the filling: Melt the praline paste and chocolate in a double boiler or in a microwave on low power, stirring until smooth. Cool to lukewarm.
- Lightly dust the cookies with cutout centers with confectioners’ sugar (if not using sprinkles). Spread the solid cookies with 3/4 teaspoon praline filling. Place a cutout cookie on top of each filled cookie. Let stand for several hours, until the filling is set.
Source: King Arthur Flour
Disclosure: Wilton provided me with round and square linzer cookie cutter sets, and three kinds of sprinkles to review. I was not compensated for this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
Posted in Cookies, Desserts, Reviews | 
Tags: almond flour, chocolate, cinnamon, hazelnuts, powdered sugar | 
4 Comments »
Mini Pumpkin Black and White Cookies
I seriously cannot believe October is upon us already. Didn’t we just celebrate New Years? I’m so confused. But I guess it’s time to start digging into all things pumpkin! Let’s start with a fun twist on a classic cookie. Check it out on my post on Culinary.net today HERE.
MINI PUMPKIN BLACK AND WHITE COOKIES
Source: Joy the Baker Cookbook, pages 60-61.
Posted in Cookies, Desserts, Halloween, Holidays, Thanksgiving | Tags: chocolate, cinnamon, powdered sugar, pumpkin | 14 Comments »
Gluten-Free Jumbo Chocolate Pomegranate Quinoa Cookie
The edits for my poster came back – no catastrophic changes! I am so excited to send it off to be printed. It’s going to be huge – 8×4 feet! Might have to roll up in it like a blanket when I’m done presenting it haha. This is likely to be my very last conference as a graduate student so hopefully it goes well. But until then, let’s talk cookies.
When gifting baked goods, I never send them off without sampling my work. Don’t want to give away icky cookies now do we? But while making this particular cookie, it didn’t occur to me that by not portioning out just a tiny teaspoon for a mini cookie, I lacked any ability for quality control. I have never used uncooked quinoa in place of old-fashioned oats in cookies before, and I could only hope they would cooperate. Why the quinoa? Because I was lazy and didn’t want to go to the store for gluten-free oats.
Nervously, this cookie went sent off to my friend Christina for her birthday and I was already preparing excuses in case it didn’t turn out well. But a few days later I get a call from her, thanking me for such a huge delicious cookie. And I knew she wasn’t lying cause I could hear here eating it while she was on the phone with me! I now have the confidence to try adding quinoa to regular cookies in the future.
One year ago: Baked Crazy Feta
GLUTEN-FREE JUMBO CHOCOLATE POMEGRANATE QUINOA COOKIE
Makes 1 jumbo or 4 regular cookies
Ingredients:
2 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
2 Tbsp sugar
2 Tbsp packed brown sugar
2 Tbsp beaten egg
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
5 Tbsp gluten-free all-purpose flour
4 Tbsp uncooked quinoa
1 Tbsp cocoa powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp xanthan gum
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 cup dark chocolate covered pomegranate seeds
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a small cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- In a medium-sized mixing bowl, stir the butter and sugars together until creamed. Add the egg and vanilla and mix.
- Stir in flour, quinoa, cocoa, baking soda, xanthan gum, salt and cinnamon and stir until fully incorporated. Add in pomegranate seeds and stir.
- Place the dough in the center of the prepared cookie sheet and bake for 13-15 minutes, until the edges are browned.
- Cool completely on a wire rack.
Source: Adapted from Bake Your Day, originally adapted from Picky Palate.
Posted in Cookies, Desserts | Tags: cocoa, dark chocolate, gluten free, pomegranate, quinoa | 3 Comments »
Dark Chocolate Black Cherry Oatmeal Cookie-wiches
Are whoopie pies cakes or cookies? I know the name says pies, but they do not resemble a pie at all. It is more like a cake-like cookie with yummy filling sandwiched between. But I suppose “cake-cookie sandwiches” isn’t as fun to say as “whoopie pies”. Twittering didn’t help either as people went either way. Some said they were both or neither, claiming to be in a category all their own. I’m going to submit this issue to “Unsolved Mysteries”.
I decided to stick to the name “cookie-wiches” for this creation because they ended up not quite looking like whoopie pies. Shun me if you dare, but these cake-like cookies were just begging to be sandwiched around some fluffy goodness. And there is even 0% Black Cherry Chobani Greek yogurt in there instead of cream cheese. Excuse me while I shake up some other baking ideologies.
Only a few more days to enter the Chobani giveaway! Find out how to enter HERE.
One year ago: Caprese Salad Grilled Cheese Sandwich
DARK CHOCOLATE BLACK CHERRY OATMEAL COOKIE-WICHES
Makes about 18 cookie-wiches
Ingredients:
COOKIES
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup sugar
2/3 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 cup 0% Black Cherry Chobani Greek yogurt
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 cups quick-cooking oats
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup unsweetened dried cherries, chopped
1 cup dark chocolate chunks (or chips)
FILLING
4 Tbsp (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup 0% Black Cherry Chobani Greek yogurt, strained through a cheesecloth overnight
3 cups powdered sugar, divided
1/2 cup flour, divided
1 tsp vanilla extract
Pinch of salt
Directions:
- In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter and sugars (by hand or with electric mixer) until creamy. Add the eggs, yogurt, and vanilla extract; mix until smooth. Add the baking powder, cinnamon, oats, and flour; stir until just mixed. Stir in the chopped cherries and chocolate. Cover and refrigerate for about 30 minutes.
- Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line two to three large cookie sheets with parchment paper.
- Drop the cookie dough by rounded tablespoon onto the cookie sheets, about two inches apart. Bake 12 to 15 minutes or until the edges are golden brown. Allow the cookies to cool 5 minutes before removing from the cookie sheets to cool completely.
- Meanwhile, using an electric mixer, cream the softened butter with the yogurt. Add 2 cups of the powdered sugar, 1/4 cup of the flour, vanilla and salt; mix on low speed until blended. Add remaining powdered sugar and flour if necessary, then beat on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Refrigerate for about 30 minutes.
- Spread the filling onto the flat side of half the cookies. Top each with remaining cookies.
Source: Cookies adapted from Little Bitty Bakes. Filling adapted heavily from Fake Ginger.
Disclosure: I was sent six 16 oz. tubs of blended Chobani Greek yogurt. I was not compensated for this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
Posted in Cookies, Desserts | Tags: black cherries, cherries, dark chocolate, Greek yogurt, oats | 9 Comments »
Guest Post: Graham Cracker and Cookie Butter Sandwich Cookies by Yums and Loves
It’s Friday so you know what that means? I take the day off and let another blogger shine! This week Alex from Yums and Loves is sharing a delicious cookie sandwich that involved the elusive Speculoos cookie butter. But as I mentioned yesterday, there is a Trader Joe’s opening near my parents house August 10th, which means these cookies will be mine very soon. Unfortunately, once I am back in Memphis I will be without a Trader Joe’s again so I will have to stock pile!
Alex is also a new mom. Her little girl, Peyton, just recently turned two months old. But she somehow still finds time to make delicious treats such as her Nutter Butter and Chocolate Cupcakes. You all know who much I love peanut butter and chocolate, so once I make these cookies, those cupcakes are next! And then maybe I’ll try combining the cookie butter with chocolate? Or peanut butter? Or both! Yesss deviousness.
One year ago: Deviled Strawberries
—————————————————————————————————————-
Hello everyone, my name is Alex and I blog over at Yums and Loves. When Erin mentioned she needed some guest bloggers I happily jumped at the chance. I owe her one! She shared an absolutely delicious guest post on my blog when I was busy with my new baby. I love reading Erin’s blog, we have so many things in common!
A while back, while shopping at Trader Joe’s, I bought a jar of the much-loved Cookie Butter. It has been sitting in my pantry, while I have been trying to figure out how to use it. I love sandwich cookies and I figured this would make a great base for a filling. While eating a big spoonful of this delicious spread I kept wishing I had a graham cracker to spread it on…..perfect! I needed a graham cracker cookie to go with the cookie butter filling. A basic cookie base with the addition of graham cracker crumbs provides a great accent to the creamy cookie butter spread. The cookie tastes just like a soft graham cracker.
Graham Cracker and Cookie Butter Sandwich Cookies
Makes 24 cookies, 12 sandwiches
¾ cup brown sugar
1 8oz stick butter, softened
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/3 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
¾ cup graham cracker crumbs, approximately 8 full graham crackers
Preheat oven to 350 and prepare baking sheets with parchment paper.
Using a mixer, cream butter and brown sugar until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add egg and vanilla and beat for an additional 2 minutes.
In a large bowl combine flour, graham cracker crumbs, baking powder, and salt.
Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients, scraping down the side of the bowl, until combined.
To make cookies uniform in size, I used a small cookie scoop. If you don’t have a cookie scoop, just try to measure out uniform dough so your cookies are easier to sandwich. Bake for 10-12 minutes, cookies will not brown much, so be careful not to overbake.
Cookie Butter Filling
¼ cup Speculoos Cookie Butter
¼ cup powdered sugar
½ tsp vanilla
¼ tsp salt
3 Tbsp softened butter
3 Tbsp heavy cream
Using your mixer combine all ingredients except heavy cream, scraping bowl as needed. Once combined add heavy cream and beat on high until smooth and creamy.
Once cookies are cool, spread a layer of cookie butter filling on the flat side of a graham cookie, top with another cookie and you have a perfect little sandwich!
Cinnamon Candied Walnut Chocolate Chunk Cookies
My first day practicing mouse tail vein injections wasn’t terrible, other than feeling bad for sticking them with a needle just for my own practice only to do it again later for real. Yes I am sympathetic towards laboratory mice. They have feelings unlike the yeast I normally have my way with.
Okay, so I realize that was a terrible way to introduce a delicious cookie post so how about this other bit of news… there is a Trader Joe’s opening near my parents house August 10th! I’m trying to figure out what time of day would be best to go, or if it would be better to wait until the craze dies down a little. Thoughts?
Now that you are thinking of food again, how about these Cinnamon Candied Walnut Chocolate Chunk Cookies I am talking about over on Culinary.net today? You should definitely check them out by clicking HERE.
CINNAMON CANDIED WALNUT CHOCOLATE CHUNK COOKIES
Source: Adapted slightly from Chasing Delicious.
One year ago: Feta, Spinach, Sun-Dried Tomato and Pine Nut Pizza with Sourdough Crust
Guest Post: Lemon-Raspberry Oatmeal Cookies by CAKE for your icing
Do you remember when I was a finalist in the “So You Wanna Be a Cakespy” contest with my Funfetti Truffle Chocolate Cupcakes? It was incredibly exciting even though unfortunately I did not win, but I have the pleasure of having the winner guest post right here on The Spiffy Cookie today! Molly from CAKE for your icing (CAKEfyi – cute blog name) won a trip to CakeSpy with her Neapolitan Blondie Bars (so extremely jealous)! It’s hard for me to be too upset that she won instead of me when she has also made things like Orange-Almond Oatmeal Sandwich Cookies and Chocolate-Peanut Butter Swirl Cookies. Just send me a few batches Molly and we’ll call it even 
.
—————————————————————————————————————-
Hello everyone! I’m thrilled to be guest posting on Erin’s blog today. I’m Molly, the blogger behind CAKE for your icing, and I have something terribly good to tell you about. It has to do with cookies, fresh fruit, and the summer sun. Yeah, I totally knew you would be interested.
I think you will all agree with me that it’s full-fledged summertime out there. I know many of you have already been experiencing this heat wave for weeks, but in Washington, we’re the last to get it. So, while some of you are sick of the heat, I’m thrilled! The sunshine is finally here, and I’m ready to spend my days outside by the water eating fresh fruits and good cookies.
I combined the best of both worlds with these Lemon-Raspberry Oatmeal Cookies. Sometimes when I think of lemon, I think of winter, but most other times the bright scent and tart flavor screams summer. Raspberries on the other hand, well, there is no debate. Raspberries mean summer to me, and I celebrate that by eating them by the handful.
These cookies use pure lemon extract and fresh raspberries in the batter to create a sweet, tart cookie. They celebrate the bright sunshine and great flavors that summer is all about.
Lemon-Raspberry Oatmeal Cookies
1/2 C Butter
1/2 C Brown Sugar
1/2 C White Sugar
1 Egg
2 Tsp Pure Lemon Extract
1 1/4 C Flour
1/2 Tsp Baking Soda
1/2 Tsp Salt
1 C Oats
2/3 C Fresh Raspberries
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
Cream the butter and sugars. Add the egg and lemon extract and beat well. Add flour, salt, and baking soda and beat until a soft dough forms. On low, beat in the oats, and then add in the raspberries. Drop by tablespoons full on to a greased cookie sheet.
Bake for 10-12 minutes, until the edges begin to brown.
Shortbread Cookies
Shortbread is not something I make with any sort of regularity. Nor can I recall my last craving for it outside of the short period of time that trefoils are sold by Girl Scouts. Seriously, that might be the only time of the year I eat shortbread unless it’s in the form of a crust for a bigger dessert. But one day I finally formed a spontaneous craving.
Do you ever crave melt-in-your-mouth shortbread? Because these quite literally do melt in your mouth. You can thank the cornstarch and powdered sugar for that. I even added some festive sprinkles to keep you in the spirit for tomorrow, July 4th – Independence Day!
It was tempting to make shortbread truffles out of the raw dough since it lacks eggs. Next time…
I know you are probably wondering what that delicious red dip is pictured with these cookies. Rest assured it will be shared in a guest post on Peanut Butter and Peppers, July 11th.
SHORTBREAD COOKIES
Makes approximately 6 dozen 1-inch cookies
Ingredients:
1 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar
1/2 cup cornstarch
1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
Pinch of salt
1/4 cup sprinkles, optional
Directions:
- Whip butter with an electric mixer until fluffy. Stir in the confectioners’ sugar, cornstarch, flour, and salt. Beat on low for one minute, then on high for 3 to 4 minutes. Add sprinkles, if desired, and fold in until distributed.
- At this point, if the dough is too soft to roll, you can refrigerate for an hour or two.
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line two cookies sheets with silicone baking mats or parchment paper, set aside.
- Roll the dough out to approximately 1/4 inch thick and cut into your favorite shape (I used a 1-inch shaped cookie cutter). Place on prepared cookie sheets and bake for 7-10 until just set and edges have not yet begun to brown. Cool on wire racks.
Source: Adapted from Allrecipes and Bakeify Blog.
Posted in Cookies, Desserts, Holidays, July 4 | Tags: butter, cornstarch, powdered sugar | 8 Comments »
Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Banana Cookies
Steph’s Bite by Bite is being graced by my presence today while she is off on a well deserved vacation. You definitely should head on over there for these cookies!
DARK CHOCOLATE PEANUT BUTTER BANANA COOKIES
Source: Adapted slightly from How Sweet It Is.
Posted in Cookies, Desserts | Tags: bananas, chocolate, dark chocolate, peanut butter | 14 Comments »
