kitchen adventures: stuffed peanut butter cookies

One of my friends linked to a blog from his Facebook, which had a recipe for stuffed peanut butter cookies. They sounded fantastic, so I gave them a whirl. They have a small amount of chocolate and a gooey sweet peanut butter in the middle, and when they're fresh out of the oven, they're heavenly (if a bit pb-heavy, according to me wife). They are a bit rich, so I can't eat too many at once, and once they're cold they lose the gooiness, but the stuffing helps them stay much more moist than most peanut butter cookies. I'll include the recipe here, and link to the original blog at the end.


First, make a normal peanut butter cookie dough.


1 stick unsalted butter, softened (I used salted butter and cut out the 1/2 tsp salt)
1/2 cup packed dark brown sugar, packed (I used a bit more than 1/2 cup light brown sugar, and used less granulated sugar)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 cup peanut butter, smooth or chunky (less sweet peanut butters work best)(I used Skippy)
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon salt (I cut this because of the butter)
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups sifted flour —if you don’t sift, use 1 1/3 cup


As with most cookie recipes, mix the wet ingredients first (I mixed the peanut butter in as the last wet ingredient, after everything else was mixed), then mix in the pre-mixed dry ingredients.


Then, in a bowl, mix together 1/2 cup of peanut butter (I used Jif) with 1/2 cup of powdered sugar. It should look (and taste) like a drier, more crumbly, but sweeter version of peanut butter.


Then, chop up a couple big squares of dark chocolate into little bits (I used half dark chocolate chips and half milk chocolate chips, chopped).


Also, mix together 1 tsp cinnamon with 1/4 cup sugar in a separate bowl.


Now that your preparations are made, it's time to get serious. Start by washing your hands. Start with a little ball of dough, and smash it flat in your hand. Add some chopped chocolate in the middle, then a little glob of the peanut butter/sugar mixture, and wrap the edges around into a nice neat little package. Roll the whole thing in the cinnamon/sugar mixture and place on a cookie sheet for baking (I pushed them down a bit to make sure they spread).


Bake at 375 degrees for 7-12 minutes (mine baked for 10 minutes). I baked them on silicone mat-lined cookie sheets to prevent burning, and they ended up crispy on the outside and gooey on the inside. Yum.


Here's the link to the recipe where I found it: http://jensfavoritecookies.blogspot.com/2010/01/peanut-butter-stuffed.html