Chocolate Cookies with Mint Frosting

Another Sunday, another baking adventure! This time, I made cookies just with the things I had on hand. These were really easy, and since I didn't have mint kisses like it says in The Life and Loves of Grumpy's Honeybunch, I looked up a different recipe for mint frosting. They are sweet and tasty and soft! Winners all around.

Chocolate Cookies
1.25 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2/3 cup brown sugar
6 tablespoons butter (margarine is fine too)
6oz semi-sweet chocolate
1 egg

Combine flour and baking soda. In a small saucepan, combine brown sugar, butter and water and heat on low until the butter melts. Add the chocolate, and stir until it is melted. Pour into a mixing bowl and let stand until cool. Beat egg into the chocolate mixture and slowly add flour mixture until well combined. Cover and chill for at least an hour or until you're ready and it's easy to handle. (Note: If you chill if overnight you will need to let the dough sit for about half an hour before molding into balls.) Shape into 1-inch balls and place on an ungreased cookie sheet. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and bake for 8 minutes (6 minutes in my oven). Allow to cool before frosting.

Mint Frosting
3 tablespoons butter, softened
1/2 teaspoon peppermint extract
dash salt
2 cups powdered sugar
2 tablespoons milk or cream (whatever you have)
green food coloring

Cream butter, peppermint and salt together. Slowly add the first cup of sugar until light and fluffy. Add milk and beat well. Add second cup of sugar and beat until creamy and smooth. Add a few drops of green food coloring and frost the cooled cookies with an icing bag or a knife.

Edited to update: Oh. Oh. I cannot stop eating these cookies. They are so delish and so little and the frosting is damn tasty. I gave some to our landlord for Christmas when I dropped off the rent today. He gave me a calendar. Haha. But really. These are so effing tasty.

Double Chocolate Layer Cake with Raspberry Filling

Another update, finally! Mike finally got a day off work, and I was in a baking mood, so I let him choose. And he picked this cake, from chaos in the kitchen. I had a hard time with the recipe-- chaos in the kitchen had batter recipe for three layers, but filling for one layer, but frosting for three... so whatever you want to do is up to you. I only made two layers (after all, I only had two cake pans!). But it turned out really tasty (even if the frosting was a little messy. I am not good at frosting cakes). Actually it was shockingly good. It was really chocolatey, but not too sweet, and the raspberry added a sweet little treat in the middle! Mike ate almost the whole thing in a week, and Kaitlin tried it and reaffirmed her claim that I will be doing the baking for her wedding (whenever that is!). So here it is... dum da dum!!!

Chocolate Cake
3oz semi-sweet chocolate (I used chocolate chips)
1.5 cups hot brewed coffee
3 cups sugar
2.5 cups flour
1.5 cups unsweetened cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1.25 teaspoons salt
3 eggs
3/4 cup oil (I used olive)
1.5 cups buttermilk
3/4 teaspoon vanilla

Grease three cake pans and line the bottoms with rounds of wax paper and parchment paper, then re-grease. Chop up the chocolate, put in a bowl, and pour the hot coffee over. Let the mixture stand, stirring until the chocolate melts and the mixture is smooth. In another bowl, combine sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. In YET ANOTHER bowl, beat the eggs with an electric mixer. Slowly add the oil, buttermilk, vanilla and chocolate/coffee mixture. Beat until combined. Add the dry ingredients and beat on medium until just combined. Divide the batter between the pans. Preheat your oven to 300 degrees F. Stick the pans in the middle of the oven and bake until a toothpick comes out clean-- about 40 minutes with my oven. Cool the layers completely on racks.

Chocolate Ganache Frosting
1/2 pound semisweet chocolate
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon light corn syrup
2 tablespoons chopped butter

Chop the chocolate. In a pot or saucepan, bring cream, sugar and corn syrup to a boil over moderately low heat, whisking until the sugar has dissolved. Remove the pan from the heat and add the chocolate. Stir until chocolate is melted. Add the butter, and whisk until smooth. Transfer the frosting to a bowl and cool, stirring occasionally, until spreadable. If it gets hard you can heat it up again a little bit 'til you can spread it.

Raspberry Filling
1 10oz bag frozen raspberries
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch.

Thaw raspberries and puree in a blender. Strain to remove the seeds (I didn't and it was fine). Heat the puree, sugar, and cornstarch to a boil, stirring constantly, until thick. Cool completely before spreading it over the cake.

This cake took ALL DAY. Not kidding. All the cooling and baking and setting took me all day! It was crazy, but so worth it.