Slice and Bake Chocolate Dipped Rosemary Shortbread Cookies

It�s cookie swap time!! Once again, I participated in The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap, an event hosted by the lovely gals of Love & Olive Oil and Little Kitchen, wherein food bloggers make cookies, send each other cookies, blog about the cookies, eat the cookies, and support Cookies for Kids Cancer, a national non-profit organization committed to funding new therapies used in the fight against pediatric cancer, and did I say eat cookies?

I�m gonna keep this short and sweet, because you�re going to have A LOT of cookie recipes to check out today. Here�s what we�re doing: buttery, herbaceous shortbread cookies, dipped in dark chocolate, with a little pinch of flakey sea salt. YES. The perfect counter-point to all the super sweet treats you�re shoving in your face right now. Around Thanksgiving, I sent these little beauties to 3 lucky ladies, and I received some fun treats in return... so basically I've been living off of cookies since Thanksgiving. Maybe we need to start a food blogger taco swap or something... OR! Food blogger cocktail swap!? Logistics might be a challenge... 
Sidenote: How rad is that custom made Washington cutting board from the amazing company AHeirloom!? We got it as a wedding gift from my friend Kristy! 


Slice and Bake Chocolate Dipped Rosemary Shortbread Cookies
Slightly adapted from this recipe
Makes approximately 24 cookies

1.5 sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
2 tablespoons honey
1/2 cup powdered sugar
2 cups flour
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1.5 tablespoons finely chopped fresh rosemary
2 tablespoons granulated white sugar
1 cup good quality dark chocolate chips
Flaked sea salt
Optional: milk chocolate chips, sprinkles

In bowl of stand mixer, cream together butter, honey, and powdered sugar.

In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, salt, baking powder, and rosemary. Slowly add flour mixture to butter mixture, beating until combined. It will should be course pea-sized clumps. Bring dough together with your hands, forming a ball (the softer your butter was, the easier the ball will come together).

On a sheet of parchment paper, roll the ball into an even-shaped log, about 14 inches long. Wrap in parchment and or plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 2-3 hours, until firm (or freeze for about 40 minutes).

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Line baking sheet with parchment paper or silicone baking mat. Slice log into disks approx. 1/2 inch thick, and place on parchment paper, with about an inch between each cookie. Sprinkle a hearty pinch of granulated sugar on top of each cookie.

Bake for approximately 20 minutes, until cookies look just golden around the bottom edge. Cool completely on a wire rack.

Melt dark chocolate: use a double boiler, or microwave for 15 second intervals, stirring between each round. Once totally melted and smooth, dip one end of cooled cookies in chocolate, and place on a parchment or wax paper to cool. Sprinkle with a pinch of sea salt and sprinkles. 

To do milk chocolate drizzle, melt chocolate, and drizzle on cookies. To do geometric dip, let dark chocolate cool completely (freezing for 10 minutes helps) before dipping in milk chocolate. 

Coconut Macadamia Biscotti | Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap 2014

It�s cookie swap time! This is my 3rd year participating in the Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap. The first year I made my ma�s recipe for the most amazing maple waffle cookies, and last year I made insanely good peppermint mocha icebox cookies. And this year? 

This has been a really tough year for me, with lots of tears and heartache. I almost wasn�t able to participate in the swap this year due to my recent posting hiatus, but luckily the head gals in charge have super big, warm, fuzzy hearts! Participating in this event seriously gave me the motivation I needed to get in the holiday spirit and start recipe planning and blogging again! So, I wanted my cookie to be all about the big, warm, fuzzy, heart-shaped part of my life, which is� 

#PIROMAR! (PS. this is a combo of Evan and my last names� it�s clearly right up there with Brangelina, Beniffer and the like, but not with Kimye, because seriously NO ONE CARES ABOUT KIMYE). We got married in October and then went on our #piromoon to Kauai! So, these cookies (which are actually biscotti) are inspired by our honeymoon� full of coconut and macadamia nuts, just like Kauai. Not full of sand or roosters though� we left those on the island. 

I made several batches of these before I got it right. I wanted the coconut flavor to come through nice and strong, and in the end it meant using every kind of coconut imaginable. Desiccated, shredded, flaked, and coconut extract! Then I threw in some mac-nuts for crunch, and topped the whole thing with a drizzle of dark chocolate! These crunchy little goodies are made to be eaten alongside a cup of hot coffee, especially if you came back from Kauai with roughly $200 worth of beans. Yoiks!  

 

PS. Want to see some of the pics from #piromoon!? (Not those kind of pics� pervs!) I have a Kauai post in the works, stay tuned! 

Coconut Macadamia Biscotti with Chocolate Drizzle

Makes about 36-40 biscotti (a bit smaller than standard sized)

� cup coconut oil

� cup granulated sugar

3 eggs

2 tablespoons coconut extract

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 teaspoon spiced rum

� teaspoon salt

pinch nutmeg

3 cups flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 cup desiccated coconut

1 cup sweetened shredded coconut, toasted and cooled to room temp

� cup large flake coconut

� cup roughly chopped salted macadamia nuts

1 cup dark chocolate chips/ chunks

Preheat oven to 375. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper

With electric or stand mixer, mix together coconut oil through nutmeg until well combined. Add flour though macadamia nuts, and mix until a solid dough-ball forms. 

Separate dough into 3 equal sized balls, and roll each one into a log, about the length of your sheet pan. Arrange each long on pan so there�s plenty of space between, and flatten to about � inch thickness. 

Bake for ~25 minutes, until golden brown. Let cool until you can handle them, then carefully slice each log into strips (about 12 pieces per log). 

Lay pieces cut side down/up on baking sheet, and bake for 6 minutes on each side. Cool on wire rack.

Once cool, melt chocolate (over double boiler or in microwave) and drizzle over biscotti.

Wait, there's more!

Looking for more recipes from the cookie swap? Check out the blogs of my random matches: the bloggers I sent these bad boys to, as well as the bloggers who sent cookies to me!

• All Things Libby
• Cooking Onions
• MOARfit
• Itz Linz 
• Palmer and Brown 
• Life Made Sweeter

The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap 2013: Peppermint Mocha Icebox Cookies

For the second year in a row, I participated in THE BEST COOKIE SWAP EVER: The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap! Last year I made Maple Waffle Cookies for the swap. This year, I decided to go minty and chocolaty.

I�m pretty much obsessed with peppermint. When peppermint ice cream starts popping up in stores I go crazy. It�s so good! And I�ll even bend my no-sugar, no-flavorings-in-coffee rule for peppermint mochas. Chocolate, coffee, peppermint...seriously, put that in my stocking this year!

I had seen peppermint mocha cookies before, but usually in drop-cookie form, with pieces of crushed candy cane mixed in the dough. I wanted to make something new, so I decided to do slice and bake cookies (icebox cookies), and then dip them in chocolate and coat that in crushed candy canes.

Sidenote #1: crushed candy canes are the most beautiful thing ever. It�s like sparkly white and pink glitter snow.

Sidenote #2: crushing candy canes kind of sucks. I put them in a big freezer sized ziplock, then wrapped that in a hand towel, then beat it with a hammer. Then, because I�m crazy and wanted perfect tiny little speckles, I sifted out the big chunks. #imcrazy

I love icebox cookies because they�re so easy. You can make the dough, then roll it in logs (which, unfortunately, resemble a friendly little Christmas cartoon named Hanky), and then freeze. Then you can fully clean your kitchen, listen to some holiday tunes, watch Home Alone, drink some hot buttered rum, get a good night�s sleep, and wake up the next day, bright eyed and ready to slice and bake!

Sidenote #3: I love the word icebox. Oooh, how retro. How very Madmen of you, Amber!

Also, thanks to the espresso powder, these cookies are super chocolaty. Like, majorly so. Like tiny little cookie shaped brownies. You�ll die ten times. Then you�ll add that cool pepperminty crunch of the crushed candy canes, and you�ll die a few more times. Probably 15 times in all.

Guys. Seriously.

Peppermint Mocha Icebox Cookies

Very loosely adapted from this recipe 

Makes about 2 dozen cookies

3/4 cup flour

3/4 cup quality unsweetened cocoa powder

2 teaspoons instant espresso powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup sugar

1.5 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 egg

12 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

1 cup dark or semi sweet chocolate chips

8-10 candy canes, crushed

Whisk flour, cocoa, espresso powder, and salt together in a medium bowl and set aside.

In bowl of stand mixer, beat sugar, vanilla, and egg on high speed until thick and pale, about 3 minutes. Add butter and continue to beat on high speed until smooth, about 3 more minutes. Using your fingers, work flour mixture into butter mixture until dough is just combined. It will be sticky and a little difficult to work with, but it's all worth it!

Divide dough in half and roll each half into a 9" log. Wrap each log in parchment paper, twisting ends tightly to make a uniform longs. Freeze for at least 8 hours or overnight.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Unwrap dough and slice each log into rounds about 1/3 inch thick. Place rounds 1/2 inch apart on parchment paper-lined cookie sheets. Bake until cookies are slightly puffy, about 8-9 minutes. Let sit on the cookie sheet for a minute before transferring to a rack to cool. Be careful, they're really soft at first. 

Let cookies cool completely. Melt chocolate in a microwave safe bowl or over a double boiler, stirring until smooth. Dip each cookie half-way in the chocolate (I tried to dip only on the top), and then dip in crushed candy canes. Set on wax paper to harden. Let cool completely. 

Enjoy!

Wait, there's more!

Looking for more recipes from the cookie swap? Check out the blogs of my random matches: the bloggers I sent these bad boys to, as well as the bloggers who sent cookies to me!

Strudel and Streusel

Thirty Five Ninety Five
Pudgie Pies

A Family Feast

DESIGN + LIFE + KIDS

It's Good to be the Cook