Chocolate Chunkers (TWD)

The cookie onslaught continues! This week's Tuesdays With Dorie recipe, Chocolate Chunksters, was selected by Claudia of Fool For Food. With the recipe calling for 19 oz of a wide array of chocolate (bittersweet, unsweetened, semi-sweet, milk, white), this is definitely a chocolate cookie on steroids!

Rounding out the ingredient list were some chopped nuts and raisins. I went with salted peanuts and instead of raisins, I went with a medley of dried cherries, blueberries and strawberries from Trader Joe's:This berry medley is really delicious and a staple in my pantry! I've mixed them into greek yogurt or oatmeal, used them as a salad topping, or eaten them right out of the bag. This is the first time that I actually used these dried berries in a recipe.
As I combined the ingredients, it was apparent to me that this was a bowl of chocolate, dried fruit and nuts with barely enough brownie-like dough to bind the ingredients together. The just mixed dough was a little moist and sticky, so I thought a little refrigeration would help it. Instead, I ended up with petrified cookie dough:
Okay, the dough didn't look too appetizing, but I assumed that these would look really delicious after they baked off. Well, I assumed incorrectly:

Okay, okay...these look a little homely. It's the taste that matters, right? These cookies went with my DH to his work, and I was told that these were snatched up in a split second by his co-workers. He said that the cookies received rave reviews and he also agreed that they were intensely chocolatey and delicious.

My thoughts? To me, this was a case of "too much of a good thing". I love the taste of the add-ins individually, but when combined into one cookie, it was a little overwhelming. Oh well, to each their own!

You can find this recipe at Claudia's site. To check out the creative variations of this cookie concocted by the Tuesday's With Dorie bakers, check out the blogroll.

Chocolate Malted Whopper Cookies (TWD)

I have total weakness for anything malted --- chocolate/vanilla malted shakes, whoppers, malted milk ice cream (thank you David Lebovitz for the recipe in The Perfect Scoop)... and these cookies! When I first purchased Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home To Yours, this recipe for Chocolate Malted Whopper Cookies was the first that I tried, and I've been baking them countless times since. I realize that I've never written a post on them (probably because they were quickly eaten before I could take pictures). Thanks to Rachel of Confessions of a Tangerine Tart, I now have an opportunity to write a post on these delicious cookies.

I have played with this recipe quite a bit, making them without the malted milk balls, substituting white chocolate for the bittersweet, adding chopped walnuts, not adding anything to the dough and using the plain cookies for ice cream sandwiches, etc. I would have to say that you can't go wrong with any of the variations, as the basic cookie dough (which has a healthy amount of malted milk and cocoa powder) has a terrific chocolatey malt flavor and a nice soft, cakey texture.
I was debating on what to do with recipe this time around, and lo and behold, look at what I encountered during my grocery run at Trader Joes:
Now, as many of you know, I'm not too crazy about peanut butter. Still, this just seemed too good to pass up! Why not substitute the whoppers with these treats. As you can see, it's essentially a malted milk ball with a layer of peanut butter and a layer of rich milk chocolate:
I used Carnation Malted Milk Powder, Callaebut cocoa powder, and coarsely chopped bittersweet chocolate (personally I wouldn't use a sweeter chocolate, as the cookie could get over the top sweet...unless you're into that). I cut the malt balls into halves (I didn't go any smaller, as they will disentigrate into the dough when baking). I like being able to distinguish what is added to the cookies, and you see the chocolate chunks and the melted malt balls in the cookie:
So, what did I think of the peanut butter malt balls? The PB flavor was subtle, and it added a nice slightly salty contrast to the malt and chocolate. I think that PB lovers would enjoy this, but personally, I'll stick to plain 'ole malt balls. These cookies are wonderful both warm just out of the oven (love the gooey melted malt balls) and at room temperature. Either way, they are delicious dunked in a glass of cold milk or served with ice cream.

If you want to make these cookies (I know you do :) ), you can find the recipe at Rachel's site. Better yet, for this recipe and many other wonderful recipes for homebaked treats, go get yourself a copy of Dorie Greenspan's cookbook, Baking: From My Home To Yours...I promise you won't regret it.

To see how the TWD bakers did with their cookies, check out the Tuesday's With Dorie blogroll.

Chunky Peanut Butter and Oatmeal Chocolate Chipsters (TWD)

Is it really Labor Day already? Where has my summer gone... in the kitchen perhaps? Anyways, as my weekend is jam packed, this post is going to be brief. This week's Tuesdays With Dorie selection, Chunky Peanut Butter and Oatmeal Chocolate Chipsters (is that a mouthful or what), comes to us courtesy of Stefany of Proceed With Caution.

(BTW, these cookies were sent to a special group of people, which I wrote about here.)
I definitely second Dorie's recommendation for chilling the dough overnight. Freshly mixed, the dough was sticky and a little difficult to handle. Chilled overnight, the dough had a nice consistency to create uniformly shaped drop cookies.

Fresh from the oven, these cookies retained a nice chunky look.

I had one cookie (not a big PB dessert fan), and...

my DH enjoyed a stack of them!

The oatmeal provided a nice bite and texture, and the cookie imparted a balanced amount of peanut and chocolate flavors. I'm not sure if I will repeat this recipe (the Granola Grabbers was much more to my liking). Still, if you're a PB and chocolate fan, this cookie should satisfy your craving.

For the recipe, visit Stefany's site. To see how my fellow 250+ bakers did, visit the TWD blogroll.