Peppermint Joe-Joe’s

A recipe for a crumbly chocolate cookie sandwiched with peppermint filling.

Source: Craving Chronicles, one of my favorite recipe sources.

Yield: About one dozen completed sandwiches.

I am a sucker for peppermint.  When we were first married, my husband and I lived on campus at a University known for it’s agriculture program.  They have an amazing creamery, and I ate lunch there as often as I could afford it.  My favorite flavor of their amazing ice cream is, you guessed it, peppermint.  The downside is that you can only get it around Christmas.  The further downside is that I no longer live in that city, and a two hour drive for ice cream seems excessive.  Right? 

These days, when I need a peppermint fix, I go to a local restaurant that has a very tasty, huge, and messy ice cream sundae.  I always get peppermint ice cream with hot fudge.  It is heaven, and I mean that most sincerely.  Eating peppermint and chocolate together is practically a spiritual experience.  

I used Pinterest as the new Google, and searched for Christmas cookie recipes.  There were an amazingly huge number of them, in the thousands.  And, because it is Pinterest, all of them are so pretty!  This chocolate-and-peppermint concoction caught my eye immediately, obviously!  It is the first in this year’s series of fun Christmas cookies, and it is no surprise at all that it came from Craving Chronicles.  

I have to admit, the dough for this cookie is a little unusual.  Actually, almost everything about this cookie is a little unusual.  This dough is really more like a crust than a cookie.  There are almost none of the traditional “wet” ingredients… no eggs, no vanilla, no liquid of any kind, just butter.  You mix the dry ingredients together, and just start adding in butter and mixing and mixing until it all comes together.  I found that it took several minutes with the stand mixer on medium speed to come together.  And it also took that extra tablespoon of butter.  I mean, 15 tablespoons?  What kind of amount is that?  2 sticks, minus 1 tablespoon – it’s unusual.  I did need that one extra tablespoon to make mine come together, but you might want to start at 15, and only add the last one if needed.  It is a very heavy dough.

The next step is to roll it out and cut circles.  You will need to flour your surface, but only lightly or the lovely black dough will turn all white-ish.  But no flour at all means your circles will turn into something decidedly un-circular when you scrape them off the sticky counter.  Try to find a balance.  My real problem during this step is that I do not own a 2-inch circle cutter.  Lame excuse?  Maybe.  I do, however, own a 3-inch circle cutter, so that is what I used.  And consequently, that is why I ended up with only one dozen cookies.  I definitely wish I had a 2-inch circle available.

The filling is also a little unusual.  You start by unwrapping 48 candy-cane kisses.  Believe me, I was perfectly happy to have a reason to buy these.  And a reason to use almost all the bag.  One word of advice, here:  Be extra sure all those little kisses tags are out, because they are amazingly camouflaged among the white-and-red kisses.  Add your cream and microwave, then add the peppermint extract after cooking.  

I actually made my cookies quite late at night as my super-busy high school son was up late finishing his science project with his father.  I was worried because the peppermint filling was still very runny, even after I let it sit a while and cool.  I had half a mind to put it in the fridge, but I didn’t want to take chances on the texture.  As it turned out, I wimped out and went to bed, and left the filling for morning.  By morning, it was fully cooled, and much thicker than it had been the night before.

A couple downsides to this cookie:  First, the cookie itself is very crumbly and has a very dry texture.  Second, the filling, although much thicker after a few hours of sitting, was still kind of soft.  The cookie had a tendency to slide around against the filling.  These two factors made them a touch messy to eat.  The upside to this cookie:  The finished product is extremely tasty!  I love the combination of regular and dark chocolate in the cookie, and I frankly think you can never go wrong with peppermint frosting!  It is also a very beautiful cookie, which I’m sure will impress anyone you serve it to.  My family was torn… half the family thought it was too dry and crumbly, but my chocolate-loving son kept asking for more, and said they were one of his favorites!

4.0 from 1 reviews

Peppermint Joe-Joe's

 

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Cook time

12 mins

Total time

12 mins

 

A recipe for a dry, chocolate cookie sandwiched with peppermint filling.

Serves: 1-2 dozen

Ingredients

• COOKIE:
• ¾ cup sugar
• 1½ cups + 3 T flour
• ½ cup unsweetened cocoa
• ¼ cup + 1 T dark cocoa
• ½ tsp. baking soda
• 1½ tsp. salt
• 15 (or 16) T butter, at room temperature, cut into ¾-inch chunks
• FILLING:
• 48 Hershey's candy cane kisses
• ¼ cup + 2 T heavy cream
• ½ tsp. peppermint extract

Instructions

1. For cookie, place dry ingredients in a stand mixer and combine.
2. Add butter, a chunk at a time, and mix until the sandy mixture combines into one lump. This may take several minutes.
3. Roll dough onto floured surface or wax paper, until it is a consistent ⅛-inch thickness.
4. Cut 2-inch circles, and place on baking sheet.
5. Bake 12-14 minutes at 350 degrees.
6. For filling, place unwrapped candies and cream in a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave for 30 seconds at a time, stirring between each, until candy is melted and mixture is smooth.
7. Add extract and allow to cool.
8. Once cool, pipe filling onto underside of cookie, and sandwich with another cookie.

2.1.7

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