Today Shane and I are celebrating four years of marriage – yay! We were reminiscing last night about the day, remembering all the little details that made it so much fun. Among my favorites? The cakes, of course! (I shared them last year if you’re curious.) As our anniversary approached, I racked my brain trying to decide what kind of cake I should make to celebrate this year. Originally I thought I’d use my 6-inch cake pans to make us a mini layer cake, but in the end decided it would probably still be too much food for two of us. Instead, I turned to Plan B – cookies. Shane loves cookies, and I already had a few recipes in mind that I’d been wanting to make for him, so it was an easy decision.
As I’ve mentioned a few times, Shane’s absolute favorite cookies are the chocolate crinkles. I’ve tried a ton of chocolate cookie recipes over the years trying to find one that can compete with the crinkles, and took this opportunity to test another. These triple threat chocolate cookies from The Pastry Queen cookbook looked like a worthy contender – they’re packed with chocolate (8 oz of bittersweet, 3 oz of unsweetened & a whole bunch of chocolate chips) and contain only a small amount of flour. As a result, they’re really dense and rich with tons of chocolate flavor. They almost reminded me of fudge, and while I found them too rich (I almost always do with chocolate cookies), Shane was a big fan. They didn’t overtake the crinkles, but I’m beginning to think it may simply be impossible for any cookie to do so.
I also baked Shane the Oreo stuffed chocolate chip cookies that have been making the rounds in the blog world over the past few months. If you haven’t seen them, the idea is simple – take homemade chocolate chip cookie dough and use it to completely enclose an Oreo cookie then bake. It takes quite a bit of cookie dough to cover the Oreo, so these cookies are huge! I found a package of unopened holiday Oreos in the pantry (no worries, the best by date is late April…) so that accounts for the red filling in my Oreos, if you were wondering. We enjoyed these mostly for the novelty factor. That’s not to say they weren’t tasty, we just didn’t think they were decidedly better than the sum of their parts. Shane is going to take some of them to work, so I’ll be curious to hear how they go over there. If you want to give them a try, you can find the recipe here.
We don’t always exchange gifts for our anniversary but we decided to do them this year. A few weeks ago Shane mentioned to me that the traditional gift for the 4th anniversary is an appliance (to be clear, even though we always check what the “traditional” gift is, we rarely pay much attention). Shane saw an opening here though – since I love being in the kitchen so much, appliance is actually a pretty cool category. I was beyond thrilled to open my gift last night (yes, we cheated & opened a day early) and find this beauty, which I’ve been lusting over for many, many months 🙂
Triple Threat Chocolate Cookies
from The Pastry Queen by Rebecca Rather
1 cup chopped pecans (I omitted)
1 cup chopped walnuts (I omitted)
6 tablespoons unsalted butter
8 oz bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
3 oz unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped
3 large eggs
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 350 F. Spread the nuts in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet and toast for 7-9 minutes, or until golden and fragrant. Cool completely.
Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
Add the butter, bittersweet chocolate and unsweetened chocolate to a small saucepan and set over low heat. Cook, stirring often, until completely melted and smooth. Remove the pan from the heat to cool.
In a large bowl, whisk the eggs and sugar together until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the vanilla and chocolate mixture; whisk vigorously until the dough is thick and glossy, about 2 minutes. Using a rubber spatula, fold in the flour, baking powder and salt, mixing only until just incorporated. The batter will be quite thick. Finally, stir in the cooled nuts and chocolate chips. Set the dough aside and let rest for 20 minutes.
Use a small cookie scoop to drop the dough onto the prepared baking sheets, leaving about 2 inches of space between the cookies. With barely wet fingertips. flatten the mounds slightly. Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until the tops of the cookies crack and look glossy. Transfer the baking sheets to wire racks, and let the cookies cool for 5-10 minutes before removing them to the racks to cool completely.
Makes about 4 dozen
These were both really great treats! Thanks for making them, and happy anniversary!
Happy anniversary! Looks like a great way to celebrate- especially those chocolate cookies
Happy Anniversary!!!! 😀
These treats look lovely! Yum!
Congrats on your anniversary! And on your new kitchen toy. 🙂
I love love love chocolate cookies, and for some reason–don’t make them very often. I’d like to try these, though!
Happy Anniversary! Very cool gift, too. 🙂
Happy anniversary! I’m luvin’ all the stuffed cookie recipes!
Happy anniversary!
Congratulations on four years of wedded bliss! I need to break out my Pastry Queen book and try those cookies – they look fantastic. And the glass Kitchenaid bowl – love it!
Congratulations and Happy Anniversary Tracey and Shane!! Many more to both of you… and them cookies looks delicious! – mary
Congrats! Sounds like a lovely – and tasty – way to spend your special day 🙂
A glass kitchen aid bowl. Perfect! Happy anniversary to the two of you!
Happy 4th to both of you! Although these cookies sound great, I’m going to have to check out the crinkles. 🙂 And is that lovely glass bowl the working part of a new mixer?!?
Thanks everyone!
@Leslie – No, just the new glass bowl for my old mixer 🙂
Happy anniversary! The cookies look amazing, what a great way to celebrate 🙂
Happy Anniversary! These cookies look like the perfect way to celebrate. Yum!
Wishing you both a very happy 4th anniversary! Yes, these do look like a triple threat – hips, waist, and thighs. But they do look oh so good.
Congratulations on your anniversary. My husband and I just celebrated our 17th wedding anniversary so I just had to congratulate you and your spouse! Many blessing to you and your family!
New reader here! 🙂 Wow those cookies look so decident. I love chocolate and especially if it comes in a cookie form. I feel like I can taste the chocolate better when it’s in a cookie instead of a cake.
And Happy 4th Anniversary 😀
Happy Anniversary! Those cookies look amazing, what a special treat to have!
Happy anniversary!!
I had never heard of the Oreo cookies before today and am now completely obsessing over them. Darn you! 😉
I hope you had a wonderful anniversary. An excellent chocolate lovers cookie.
The stuffed oreo cookie is huuuuge.
Hmmm….I’m thinking the nuts would’ve cut some of the the richness
@Anonymous – you’re probably right, we just don’t like nuts so I always omit them from everything. Luckily my husband never thinks anything is too rich!
It sounds like you had a great anniversary! Let us know how you like the glass mixer bowl. It looks like it has a lid, which is really nice.
The chocolate cookies look wonderful. When a cookie is really rich, it’s easier for me to not eat so many!
Happy anniversary! The cookies look delicious!
Great anniversary present!!! And swooning over your chocolate cookies 🙂
Happy Anniversary Tracey and Shane. Those cookies look amazing. Bookmarked to try asap!