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I'm sure a lot of you read Smitten Kitchen's blog.  If not, you need to go there right now and start reading.  I'll wait here... okay, are you back?  She is a huge inspiration and one of the many reasons I started writing this blog.

A few years ago I found her blog accidentally when I wanted to make some homemade oreos and started googling.  She has the most fantastic oreo recipe and I've made it several times.  It's always been in the back of my mind that the dough would be great for cut out cookies.  So, this year when I was narrowing down my choices for the cookies I was going to make for various cookie exchanges I decided to try out my idea.

I decided to use a stocking cookie cutter and make the filling mint, in keeping with the holiday theme.  The dough really held together well, and I think you could easily use it to cut out pretty much any shape.  The filling itself is so neutral that you could easily flavor it with any extract to really customize your cookies.  Of course, you could just leave the recipe as is to make traditional oreos!

I found the dough was easier to roll out when it wasn't super cold right out of the refrigerator.  It's pretty easy to roll even when it's warm, but I noticed that the cookies that I baked from the room temperature dough poofed up a lot more while they baked.  They still looked like stockings, but the cookies cut from the cooler dough retained their shape better.  Depending on what you're doing with them you may not care.  Just be sure to liberally flour your work surface so the dough doesn't stick; or if you don't want to add more flour you can always roll the dough out between two pieces of plastic, use powdered sugar or you could use cocoa.

As I said, I got this recipe from Smitten Kitchen's blog, and I don't think I made any changes, except for cutting them out, and making the filling mint.  So go make some oreos and enjoy!

-The Baker

Homemade Oreos (from www.smittenkitchen.com)

Yield: 41 cookies (this will vary depending on how big the cookies you make are)

Prep: Preheat oven 375 F



CHOCOLATE WAFER COOKIE:

  • 1 ¼ C AP Flour
  • ½ C Dutched cocoa (unsweetened)
  • 1 t Baking Soda
  • ¼ t Baking Powder
  • ¼ t Salt
  • 1 C Sugar
  • ½ C + 2 T (1 ¼ sticks) Butter
  • 1 Egg
  1. sift together flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, salt and sugar into mixing bowl
  2. on low speed add butter until it looks “sandy”
  3. add egg; mix until dough comes together
  4. scoop (using #70 scoop; will make 41 balls)
  5. divide balls in ½ and roll into a disk (can fit 24-4X6-on a ½ sheet)
  6. bake for 8 minutes
  7. *To use this wafer cookie for making ice cream sandwiches increase the sugar to 1 ½ C*
CREAM FILLING:

  • ¼ C (½ stick) (57 g) Butter
  • ¼ C (57 g) Vegetable Shortening
  • 2 C (358 g) 10X (sifted)
  • 2 t Vanilla Extract
  1. in mixing bowl add all ingredients
  2. in low, mix until filling comes together; be sure it's not too dry because the cookies won't stick together; if dry add a bit more vanilla
  3. then turn mixer on high and beat for 2 minutes until filling is light and creamy
To assemble:
  1. half of the baked cookies will be tops and the other half will be bottoms
  2. scoop filling (using #70 scoop) and put on the bottoms
  3. place the tops on the filling and gently squeeze to spread the cream to the edges