Baking Cookies with John Mayer

Chocolate and spice. To me, they go hand in hand. In fact, I prefer my chocolate to have an edge. No milk bars for me, bring on the 70% dark with cocoa nibs and chile pepper. I have been thinking about making some spiced chocolate icebox cookies for a week, but I needed to 1) find a good starting recipe and 2) make it happen.

Tonight, I finally baked some up with my new friend John Mayer. You see, he and I have developed a very close relationship over the last few days, and, what with his On Demand VH1 specials expiring at midnight and my access to his Storytellers episode coming to a close, I felt I should celebrate our time together.




So while Mr. Mayer sang the best of his back catalog and played some bitchin' guitar, I got out the butter, flour and sugar, and mixed up some lovin' from the oven. I started with this recipe for plain chocolate icebox cookies and then spiced it up a little. You know when I said I don't mess with recipes for baked goods? Yeah, I lied. It started with a little cinnamon and a little Mexican chocolate, but then I didn't have enough cocoa so I had to improvise a little. It kind blew up from there.



I didn't take these cookies quite as far into spicy as I had originally intended, but they do have a nice warmth. I think in this case there is something to be said for subtlety. Even though they aren't exactly what I had in mind when I started out, they're still pretty darn good dunked into tea. I've posted the final recipe as I made it below, but if I did it again I would up the spice factor (1/2 or 3/4 tsp cinnamon maybe, a full 1/4 tsp black pepper? I will have to play with this), use all cocoa, leave in the extra 2 Tbsp of sugar, and not bake them quite as long (take out at 8-9 min?).



*Soundtrack optional, but something tells me the man appreciates quality baked goods.

Spiced Chocolate Icebox Cookies

1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa (I ran out and used 1/4 cup cocoa and 1/4 cup hot chocolate mix)
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt (table salt)
1/4 tsp Mexican Cinnamon, ground (canela)
1/8 tsp black pepper, ground
3/4 cup butter, unsalted and softened (3/4 cup = 1.5 sticks)
1/2 cup packed dark brown sugar (original recipe calls for light, I was out)
1/2 cup minus 2 Tbs sugar (I removed 2 Tbs to compensate for the sugar in the drink mix, if using all cocoa leave in)
2 squares (2 oz) - ish chocolate, melted and cooled (I used 2 squares Mexican Chocolate plus 1/2 square Belgian Dark to smooth it out)
1 tsp vanilla
1/8 tsp almond extract
1 large egg

Mix Dry Ingredients
1) In a medium-large sized bowl, thoroughly mix together flour, cocoa (or cocoa/hot chocolate mix), baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and pepper with a whisk or a fork.

Mix Wet Ingredients
2) In a second, larger, bowl, beat butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar with a mixer on medium until light and fluffy (if you don't have a mixer this will still work, just use a whisk and some arm strength). Beat in chocolate, vanilla, and almond extract until well combined. Beat in egg.

Mix Wet and Dry Ingredients
3) Reduce speed to low and beat in flour mixture in three batches. Combine well after each addition.

4) Divide dough in half, roll into 12" logs, and wrap in parchment paper. Refrigerate at least 2 hours, or overnight. You can also wrap parchment covered log in plastic wrap and freeze.

Bake
5) Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Remove one log of dough from the fridge (leave second log in the fridge to remain firm or keep for later use) and cut into 1/4 inch slices. Place slices on two parchment lined cookie sheets one inch apart.

6) Bake 10-11 minutes, switching the sheets between racks halfway through baking. Cool on cookie sheets for 1 minute, transfer to wire cooling racks (or a plate) to cool completely. Repeat for remaining dough.