Trick or Treat Cookies

 

     I mentioned in my last post that I try to put things I eat through the "worth it" test. Is it worth the fat, calories and extra exercise necessary if I indulge. Well, these cookies are absolutely WORTH IT! They are a little scary looking (after all-they are for Halloween) but they taste so good!

 

Ingredients:

 

3 sticks of unsalted butter

1 1/2 cups brown sugar, packed

1 cup white sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp. vanilla (I only use real vanilla)

scant tsp. of salt

1 tsp. baking soda

4 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (I use Hershey's)

4 cups of chopped Snickers , Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and M & M's (I used peanut)

1 cup broken pretzels

orange food coloring

 

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees

 

Cream together butter, brown sugar and white sugar.

Add the eggs and vanilla and beat until fluffy.

Mix salt and baking soda with flour and slowly

mix into butter mixture. Beat until dough forms.

 

Split the dough in half and place in separate bowls.

 

Stir cocoa powder into one half of the dough.

You can see a few "white spots" in mine, it

doesn't hurt anything.

 

Add orange food coloring to the other half of

the dough. This step is not necessary if you

want a black/white cookie. If that is the case, use

 the "white" dough as is without adding any food coloring.

 

Into each bowl of colored dough, fold

in 1 1/2 cups of the mixed candy (not the pretzels).

 

Roll the chocolate dough and the orange

dough into balls. Cut the balls in half and press

a half of each color together to

form a cookie. Place on cookie

sheet and slightly flatten.

 

     Press remaining 1 cup of mixed candy and the broken pretzels into the flattened cookie tops. Bake approx. 12 minutes, until slightly brown around the edges. Allow to cool on cookie sheet a few minutes and remove to wire racks to finish cooling. These cookies break easily when warm. Allow them to cool enough before removing. I left my pretzel pieces fairly large because I wanted "scary looking" cookies for Halloween. You could certainly have a prettier cookie if the pretzel pieces were smaller. The melted snicker bars (yum) may ooze out a bit while baking. With the edge of a knife or spatula, push the melted snicker back to the edge of the cookie while very warm. 

 

I am joining Michael @ Rattlebridge Farm for Foodie Friday.