Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies
Cookie:
- 8 tablespoons (115 grams or 1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 1 cup (255 grams) smooth peanut butter, at room temperature
- ½ cup (100 grams) granulated sugar
- ½ cup (95 grams) firmly packed light brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 2 cups (250 grams) all-purpose flour
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon fine or flaky sea salt
- 8 ounces (230 grams) semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
- 3 tablespoons (50 grams) smooth peanut butter
- 2 tablespoons (30 grams) unsalted butter
- Pinch of sea salt
Instructions:
Small and light, it might be the rare peanut butter chocolate dessert that goes as well with tea as it does with a swarming pack of sugar-hyped three-year-olds at a birthday party.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter until it is light and fluffy, then add the peanut butter and beat until smoothly combined. Add the sugars and beat until combined. Add the egg and beat until the batter is smooth. In a medium bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients: flour, baking soda, and salt. Add the dry ingredients to peanut butter mixture and mix at a low speed until just combined. The dough will be thick and a bit crumbly. Divide the dough into two parts, placing each on a piece of plastic wrap. If you’d like to slice the cookies from a log, form each dough half into a 1¼-to-1½-inch log that should be about 12 inches long. Wrap each log and freeze for 30 minutes, until firm. If you’d like to roll out the cookies, flatten the packets a little and place them in the fridge for at least an hour before rolling the cookies out.
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Line two or three baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Slice each log of frozen cookie dough into just shy of ¼-inch slices. I like to hold the end of the log gently with two fingers as I slice the cookies, because they are so prone to breaking.
- First, promise me you know what you’re getting into. These cookies are crumbly and the dough, it will not want to be rolled out. It helps to let it warm up a little and use as little flour as possible. And again, accept that the dough will be crumbly and keep nudging it back together until the cutouts resemble cookies. The upside of all of this crumbliness is that the cookies hold their shapes nicely in the oven.
- Roll out one dough disc at a time until it is a little shy of ¼ inch thick. Cut into desired shapes—I used a 1⅓-inch fluted square for mine and encourage something equally petite as the peanut butter cookies are intense, especially in sandwiched pairs. Gather your scraps, attempting to pick up as little flour as possible, and knead them back into something resembling a ball of dough. It will be fragile. Roll the dough again into the same thickness and cut into cookies.
- Transfer the formed cookies to prepared baking sheets with a thin spatula and bake for 10 to 12 minutes. They should be a little puffed and faintly golden at the edges when they are finished. Transfer the cookies to cooling racks and cool completely before filling.
- In the top of a double boiler or in a bowl set over simmering water, combine the chocolate, peanut butter, butter, and a pinch of sea salt, whisking together until they are melted and smooth. Let the mixture cool until it is thick but spreadable. You can speed this process up in the fridge or by setting the bowl in another bowl of ice water, but for both methods, be sure to stir frequently so that it chills evenly.
- Dollop half the cookies with about 1 teaspoon of chocolate peanut butter filling each. You can do this with a butter knife or, if you wish to be more precise, you can use a pastry bag with a round tip, or a sandwich bag with the corner snipped off. Place a second cookie over the chocolate mixture, and press the cookies gently together so that the filling approaches the edges. Repeat with the remaining cookies. Let the cookies set until the chocolate is mostly firm.