Tuesday, 11/27

The experiment was quite the success.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about trying to come up with my Christmas cookie list for the year, and mentioned that I'm always thinking of ways to tweak or to upgrade some of the cookies. Well, in the course of exploring new ideas, I came across something that intrigued me. I mentioned it to Loraine, who then opined that the new idea would actually work well with one of my existing cookies.

Lo and behold, she was right. So without further ado, I present the Nutella-stuffed Nutella cookie--

Yup. It's a cookie with dough that includes Nutella, all wrapped around a gooey Nutella center.

If that doesn't scream “Christmas', I don't know what does.

8-)

I've never actually made a cookie (or a lava cake) with a gooey center before, but it was surprisingly easy, although a little messy. You actually have to freeze the Nutella into balls before you make the cookies, which is simple. But then you have to handle the frozen Nutella when making them, and since frozen Nutella melts REALLY quickly in human hands, just be forewarned--

You'll be washing your hands a lot.

After I made the cookies yesterday I was sitting around thinking of ways that they could be amped up even more, and it seems like the cookies, when finished, could be sprinkled with various spices to make them even stranger. You could dust them with cinnamon, or ginger, or even red pepper or Cayenne flakes, if you were adventurous. Or, you could just eat them plain.

Trust me. That option is quite easy.

This will now replace the plain 'ol “boring” Nutella cookies that I usually make for the holidays, which means that I now have something “new”. I don't need to come up with something I haven't done before, because while I HAVE made Nutella cookies before, they haven't been stuffed with even more Nutella. And sometimes, that's all you need for a cookie, “new” or not.

******

The recipe, should you want to try them yourself?

Make 24 teaspoon-sized balls of Nutella, and freeze them

Then mix:

1 stick butter

¾ cup sugar

¾ cup Nutella

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

After that, mix together

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

And add that to the wet stuff. Then take that dough, and wrap bits of it around each frozen ball of Nutella. Make at 350 for 10 minutes. When done, eat in copious amounts.

(jim@wmqt.com)