Irish Cream Chocolate Sandwich Biscuits

I checked my BBM the other day to find a colleague changed her avatar. This in itself is not remarkable--pretty much everyone on BBM (except for me) seems to change their avatars regularly. Sometimes it's a wee self portrait or image of their child. Sometimes is a vacation snap or some other image that strikes their fancy.

What caught my eye was an image of an Oreo cookie, with a note wishing the popular sandwich cookie a happy 100th birthday.

Oreos are 100 years old?

Really?

Like so many people, I have a soft spot for Oreos. Some people are crunchers, others like to pry apart the sandwich and lick off the filling. I prefer mine dunked in milk until the biscuits practically melt away on my tongue.

But here's a confession. I really don't like the icing. It's too sweet and the texture is just...meh. I think it's because it's made with shortening (or so I've been told)--I've never really been fond of shortening. Give me lard or butter any day. Well...for icing, give me butter. I'm sure one can make an adequate icing from lard, but I'd rather not find out.

So when I saw the birthday wishes on my phone's screen, I thought 'why not bake my own Oreos?'

So when I saw the date, I thought 'Why not start my St. Patrick's Day foodishness a wee bit early?'

I've been rather busy as of late, so I haven't had the time to develop my own cookie dough for this recipe. After looking up a few recipes, I decided to use one based on a recipe from Gourmet Magazine. Flavouring the filling with Irish cream was pretty much a foregone conclusion (well, in my mind, it was).

The resulting chocolate sandwich cookies were delicious--nicely chocolatey with a soft Irish cream flavour. I'm sure you can change up the filling flavour with another liqueur...but for March, Irish cream just seems fitting.

Irish Cream Chocolate Sandwich Biscuits (Oreos)
adapted from Gourmet Magazine's Double Chocolate Sandwich Cookies
Yield 24

Ingredients

For the biscuits
200g (1c + 6 Tbsp/330ml) all purpose flour
40g (6Tbsp/90ml) cocoa powder
0.25tsp (1.25ml) baking powder
pinch salt
150g (0.66c/185ml) butter, softened
2Tbsp (30ml) milk or cream
0.75tsp (3.75ml) vanilla

for the filling
55g (0.25c/60ml) butter, softened
100g (0.75c/185ml) icing sugar
2dspn (20ml/4tsp) Irish cream liqueur (maybe a drop more, if you wish)

Method
For the biscuits

Sift together the flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt. Set aside

Cream together the butter and sugar. Beat in the milk and vanilla. Mix in the flour mixture in two additions, until the dough comes together. Form into a disc, wrap in cling and chill for about an hour.

Preheat the oven to 170C/350F. Line two cookie trays with parchment.

Roll the dough out between two pieces of wax or parchment paper, until it's about 3mm (1/8th") thick. Using a 3.75cm (1.5") round or fluted cutter, cut out the biscuits and place them on the prepared sheets, approximately 1.25cm (approx 0.5") apart. Gather the scraps, form into a disc and rechill before re-rolling.

Bake the biscuits for 10 minutes. Remove to a cooling rack and let fully cool before assembling the cookies.

For the filling:
Beat together the butter and the icing sugar until well mixed. Add in the Irish cream and beat well. Chill for at least an hour before using.

To assemble: smear about a half to three-quarter teaspoon of icing onto the flat side of a cooke. Press a corresponding cookie top to the icing. If the icing is soft, chill, uncovered, in the fridge for about an hour until the filling firms up.


cheers!

jasmine

I'm a quill for hire!