Oreo

A super-easy and quick recipe for homemade Oreos. Customize with different frosting flavors to suit your taste.

Yield: about 4 dozen unfrosted, or 2 dozen small sandwiched cookies.

Source: as with so many of my best recipes, this one came from my Grandmother.

What a dilemma I found myself in this week. After my last post, Peanut Butter Sandwich cookies, I was left with a fair amount of peanut butter frosting in my fridge. What to do? What to do? I just couldn't bring myself to let all that sweet, peanuty loveliness go to waste. The solution? Oreos, of course!!

This is honestly the easiest cookie recipe I have ever seen. That is because it is made with a boxed cake mix. All the good stuff is already in there, and you just have to add in the wet ingredients. So here is the recipe:

1 box cake mix, any chocolate flavor

1/2 cup shortening

2 eggs

Yep, that's it. I used a Devil's food mix, which is all dark and rich and wonderful. I did have to mix a little more than usual, to get everything moistened, but that is not a problem.

I do like to make these cookies quite small, because they get sandwiched together with another cookie and lots of frosting, which is a serious overkill of calories. (Not that I'm counting!) I learned from my experience with the Peanut Butter Sandwich cookies, and rolled the dough into neat little balls. If you have one of those nice cookie dough scoops, that would certainly work nicely, but I don't, so I am reduced to using my hands.

I used a glass to smash the dough down flat, though this step is certainly not necessary. It's just a preference of mine. They stack nicer if they are flat. Is that a silly reason? Perhaps. I baked them at 350 degrees for about 9-10 minutes. By the way, let me apologize for the poor quality of the picture. All my pics turned out bad today. I didn't realize it until I was done baking, and as much as I love you all, I just wasn't willing to make another batch of cookies so I could take better photos. Sorry.

Normally, these babies get frosted with this wonderful cream cheese frosting:

8 oz. cream cheese

3 cups powdered sugar

2 T. milk

A word about quantities, here. I usually double this cookie recipe. That is, 2 cake mixes worth of cookies. Then, this frosting recipe is closer to the right amount. If you are not doubling the cookies, then you will certainly want to halve the frosting recipe. I hate to see cream cheese go to waste!

My personal choice for customizing this frosting:

First, I like to add a little mint extract and green food coloring to the cream cheese frosting for mint Oreos. I'm fond of mint, especially when coupled with chocolate, so it's a natural choice.

Second, the peanut butter frosting in this post is the best I have ever had. It is seriously delicious in the Oreos as well.

Third, is there such a thing as too much chocolate? Doubtful. Add a couple tablespoons of cocoa powder to the frosting for double chocolate Oreos. I can feel the Chocolate coma coming on!

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Peanut Butter Sandwich

My most requested cookie to date! Peanut butter cookies sandwiched with peanut butter frosting. The little neighbor girl said, "I can't stop thinking about those cookies!"

Yield: 5-6 dozen regular cookies, or 2.5 - 3 sandwiches. Unless you like the raw dough, then make that 2 dozen sandwiches.

Source: Our Best Bites website, linked below. My neighbor sent me the link. Thanks a lot, Jen!

Oh joy, oh rapture!! The admittedly un-sophisticated crowd I asked for opinions of this cookie gave it an average score of 12 out of 10. (Most of them were younger than 12 years old.) I have to agree, though; they are seriously amazing.

My friend sent me this link, which is where I found the recipe. You can also find a link to Our Best Bites on my right sidebar. I'll give you the recipe here, too, just for kicks.

1 cup butter flavored shortening

1 cup creamy peanut butter

1 cup sugar

1 cup brown sugar

1 tsp. vanilla

3 eggs

2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

3 cups flour

And the frosting:

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 cup creamy peanut butter

4 cups powdered sugar

4-5 T. milk

1 tsp. vanilla

Here's a couple things I learned during the creation of this dough:

First, this isn't my favorite peanut butter cookie recipe of all time. If, I mean when, I make these cookies again, I will use the recipe I used for the Peanut Butter Stuffed cookies, which is my all-time favorite. (Well, all-time favorite for peanut butter cookies. How can a girl really be pinned down to just ONE favorite cookie? :D )

Second, I will admit that I used dark brown sugar in this dough, but only because I had it on hand and had no idea what else to do with it. I really don't think it makes a huge difference though.

Third, I was too lazy to roll the dough into cute little balls and cover them in sugar. I just plopped the dough on the cookie sheet and used the fork to do the cute little cross-hatch pattern that is the signature of peanut butter cookies. I actually wish I had at least rolled them into balls first. I'm sure they would have turned out cuter, closer to actually round, and more professional looking. Mine looked okay, not as bad as a 5 year old making them, but maybe a 10 year old. For example, this cookie turned out a little screwy.

What can you do with a cookie like that?

Maybe just a little bite...

Or two...

The Best Bites author says she made hers small, and baked them at 375 degrees for 6 minutes. They must have been really small! Mine were pretty small, and I had to give them 8 minutes to get them done enough for my liking. I agree with her, though, that it is a huge shot of sugar all at once, and a smaller cookie is probably a good idea.

On to the frosting. This recipe makes enough frosting to feed a small army. Half the frosting would probably have been enough. As you know, I'm not big on measuring things for my frosting. I did measure everything except the powdered sugar this time. I put the sugar in last, adding and stirring until it's a good consistency. I don't think mine had 4 cups in it, though. If I had to guess, I would say it was closer to 2 1/2 or 3 cups. I may have to make oreo cookies now, to get rid of the extra frosting!

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Maple Frosted Cookies

Yield: 3-4 dozen

Source: Food Network .com, link below. Recipe provided by Dennis Brady, and apparently part of Emeril's cookie contest show.

It has been years since I have experienced such an epic failure in cookie making. It was quite disheartening, to tell you the truth. But I have decided to learn from my mistakes, and share my *ahem* wisdom with you.

Honestly, these Maple Cookies sounded great when I first saw the recipe on Food Network. I love those maple donuts, so maple cookies sounded like a natural choice. Plus, it is a little unusual, something you don't have everyday. I kind of like standing out, so it totally appealed to me.

Okay, let me start with the recipe, then I will tell you a little more specifically of my experience.

1 cup butter, softened

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla

1 tsp. maple extract

1/4 cup maple syrup

1/2 tsp. salt

2 1/2 tsp. baking powder

4 cups flour

It all went well until I put in the flour. Maybe it's because I'm not big on sifting. But, I prefer to think that I just didn't follow my instincts. 4 cups of flour sounds like a lot, because it is a lot. Too much, in fact. This dough turned out seriously dry, as you can see in the picture. The thing is, I have never made this recipe before, nor do I know anyone who has made this recipe, so I had no frame of reference at all. Am I sounding too defensive here? I'd like to tell you that I didn't know it was too dry, but I did. It looked like it was going to be a problem.

The next step is to wrap the dough in plastic wrap and chill it for at least 4 hours, until firm. My dough got very seriously firm. The directions call for you to roll out the dough to a 1/4" thickness, and cut out circles. (To see what that 1/4" looks like, see my post about Soft Sugar Cookies.) When I rolled it out, it practically fell apart.

I ended up with something resembling a chain of small islands, rather than nice soft cookie dough.

Anyway, they did look very pretty on the baking sheet. I baked them at 375 degrees for about 8 minutes. They came out all lovely and cakey. The super heavy dough meant that the cookies didn't spread or change shape at all. Not even a little bit. It was almost creepy.

The plain cookies are really plain. The flavor was bland, almost non-existent. I had high hopes that some maple icing would resurrect these cookies.

And, that was when I noticed it. The thing I missed when I read the recipe too quickly the first time. Maple Sugar. What is that? Who buys that? And no, it's not brown sugar. Brown sugar is made with molasses, which comes from sugar cane, not maple, which comes from trees.

4 T. butter

1 tsp. maple extract

1 cup powdered sugar

1/4 cup maple sugar

I have a hard and fast rule about making cookies. It might be a little snobby, but I am not willing to give it up. I never use ingredients from specialty stores. I refuse to make cookies that require a trip to anything other than my local grocery store. Sorry, but rules are rules. (Well, actually, I'm not sorry, but that is a post for another day.)

I decided to make do. I just left the maple sugar out, and let the maple extract do all the talking. It did fine, by the way. The frosting actually turned out great, with a wonderful mapley flavor. It totally did remind me of the maple donuts. Once the cookies were frosted, they tasted much better. However, you will definitely need a glass of water or milk with this cookie, it dries out the mouth something fierce.

In the end, I threw away about half the dough because I had such a hard time rolling it out. And, the frosting wasn't nearly enough for an entire batch. My husband's comment was that I should never make these cookies again. I might have to disagree with him though. I committed to only posting great cookies on this blog, and this post seems to have gone against that directive. However, I think I may try them again, because I believe they have potential. If/when I make them again, I will certainly use less flour. I think these will taste much better if they are soft and pliable. I may increase the amount of maple syrup and maple extract in the cookie dough, to make the actual cookie more flavorful. But I will keep that wonderful maple frosting as-is!

By the way, if you decide to attempt this recipe yourself, I beg you to e-mail me and tell me about your experience. I'm always looking for compatriots!

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Chocolate - Chocolate Chip

Yield: about 3 dozen

Source: Food Network .com, creator unknown, link below.

I found this recipe just recently on the Food Network website. I was pretty excited because they look pretty darn chocolaty, and frankly, that always makes me happy.

I read the ingredients before I went to the store, but frankly, I was a little depressed when I started making the cookies and realized I had messed up. I am way too sick of quick grocery store trips to make another one, so I made do. But more on that later.

The recipe is as follows:

1 stick butter

6 oz. bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped

2 eggs

1 egg yolk

1 cup brown sugar

2 tsp. vanilla

1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. ground cloves

1 1/4 cups flour

6 oz. chocolate chips

6 oz. white chocolate chips

The first step here is to finely chop the chocolate. Once I started doing this, I realized I had bought a 4 oz. bar, and the recipe calls for 6 oz. It was then that I decided that 4 oz. was plenty of chocolate for 1 small batch of cookies, and that was all I used. As it turns out, when I made my family taste the cookies and give me feedback, they all told me it was really chocolaty, so feel free to use this trick yourself, if you want. (Incidentally, my family gives this cookie an 8 or 9 out of 10.)

Start by melting the butter, and adding the chopped chocolate to the hot butter. Let it sit for a few minutes to let the chocolate melt. Meanwhile, mix together the eggs and yolk, brown sugar, and vanilla. Then slowly whisk in the melted chocolate mixture. Add the dry ingredients, and mix just until everything is incorporated. Do not overwork the dough. Fold in the chips. Cover in plastic and refrigerate for 2 hours or so.

I was a little concerned about the cloves in this recipe. It is a bit unusual for a chocolate cookie, but it does make it stand out a bit, and gives it a quality that can be noticed. My husband really liked the cloves in it, and I think he liked it more once I pointed it out.

I actually made these cookies quite small, as is my habit lately. The recipe calls for baking for 13-15 minutes at 350 degrees, but since mine were smaller, I baked for only 9-10 minutes. It is best to let these sit on the cookie sheet for a couple minutes before moving them to a cooling rack. These should be moist in the center, and a little crackly on the outside. Honestly, mine turned out a little too soft, I think. They could probably have used another minute to bake.

If you want to have a really fun time, make your family guess the mystery ingredient (cloves) that makes this cookie so different, and see what they come up with.

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Cookie Making Tips #1: Butter or Shortening?

Should you use butter or shortening in your cookies? Here are some things to consider:

Knowing the differences between butter and shortening can help you decide which ingredient is right for your cookies. The main reason for using shortening instead of butter is that it has a higher melting point. This helps the cookies maintain their shape during baking, leaving you with a puffier, more cake-like cookie. Butter’s lower melting point increases the spread of the dough during baking, resulting in a flatter, browner, and crispier cookie. Butter also has water in it naturally, while shortening does not. If you plan to use shortening in a recipe that calls for butter, you may want to add some water to the dough; about 1.5 teaspoons per ¼ cup of shortening. Most people will still prefer the taste of butter over shortening.

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