Cookie Calendar: Chocolate Crinkles

Not having my King Arthur Flour baking books here with me, I can't say for sure that this version of Chocolate Crinkles from the flour maker's web site is the one I baked for a past Christmas (I seem to remember using Dutch-processed cocoa), but it's likely close enough.

The cookies produced have a deep, dark, chocolaty flavor that makes you feel all tingly inside. Plus, with that contrasting white sugar on top highlighting all the crackles in the cookie's surface, these treats also please the eye.

I remember these being especially a hit with my aunts, including the one who passed away a year and a half ago, just like the jam-filled rugelach.

Cookie Tip #18: It's often recommended in cookie baking that you bring all ingredients to room temperature before beginning the mixing. Supposedly, you can work more air into warmer ingredients, plus they're easier to work with. If you've planned ahead, you can take out your butter and eggs for the day as soon as you wake up in the morning, and they should be ready for you by the time you start baking. I've read that you can speed up the softening of butter by using the microwave, but I've always ended up with butter that's melted on the outside and stone cold on the inside. Melted butter is definitely not a recipe for success! Instead, I like to just cut the butter into chunks and throw it in the mixer bowl cold. But before I add the sugar, I run the mixer for a minute or two, until the butter turns soft and coats the sides of the bowl.

Chocolate Crinkles
Source: King Arthur Flour
Yield: 5 dozen cookies

• 1 ⅓ cups (8 ounces) chopped bittersweet chocolate or chocolate chips


• ½ cup (4 ounces, 1 stick) unsalted butter


• ⅔ cup (4 3/4 ounces) sugar


• 3 large eggs


• 2 teaspoons vanilla


• 2 teaspoons espresso powder (optional)


• ½ teaspoon baking powder


• ¼ teaspoon salt


• 1 ⅔ cups (7 ounces) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour


• confectioners' sugar* (for coating)

Dough: Place the chocolate and butter in a small saucepan or microwave-safe bowl, and heat or microwave till the butter melts. Remove it from the heat, and stir until the chocolate melts and the mixture is smooth.

In a separate bowl, beat together the sugar, eggs, vanilla and espresso powder. Stir in the chocolate mixture, baking powder and salt, then the flour. Chill the dough for 2 to 3 hours, or overnight; it'll firm up considerably.

Shaping: Put about a cup of confectioners' sugar into a shallow bowl. Using a teaspoon-sized cookie scoop, a spoon, or your fingers, scoop out heaping teaspoon-sized portions of the dough; they should be roughly 1 1/4 inches in diameter. Drop the dough balls into the confectioners' sugar as you go. Once about five or six are in the bowl, shake and toss the bowl to coat the balls with the sugar. (If you try to do this with too many balls at a time, they'll just stick together.)

Baking: Place the coated dough balls on a lightly greased or parchment-lined cookie sheet, leaving about 1 1/2 inches between them. Bake the cookies in a preheated 325°F oven for 10 to 12 minutes, switching the position of the pans (top to bottom, and front to back) midway through the baking time. As the cookies bake, they'll flatten out and acquire their distinctive "streaked" appearance. Remove the cookies from the oven, and allow them to cool on a wire rack.

Notes:
*We often call for our glazing sugar to be substituted for confectioners' sugar, as it's a "purer" sugar: it doesn't include cornstarch. However, in this case, go with confectioners' sugar; the cornstarch keeps the sugar from melting atop the cookies as they bake.

Nutritional notes:
Nutrition information per serving (2 cookies, 28g): 113 cal, 6g fat, 2g protein, 5g complex carbohydrates, 8g sugar, 30mg cholesterol, 33mg sodium, 38mg potassium, 38RE vitamin A, 1mg iron, 10mg calcium, 25mg phosphorus, 6mg caffeine

Download Chocolate Crinkles into MacGourmet.