Mexican Hot Chocolate Cookies

Have you ever experienced sweet and spicy or am I the only one who's been in the dark about this scrumptious combo? Well wait a minute...now that I think of it, gingersnaps might fall under that category and I LOVE gingersnaps.

Now mind you....I'm not talking about spicy "hot"....I'm talking about spicy "flavor".

.oO(I wonder if Martha thinks these cookies are "hot" since thats what they're called....)

Ya....this is a Martha Stewart recipe. I recently re-subscribed to Everyday Food (happens to be one of my favorite food magazines) and I was thumbing through it the other day when I saw a picture of chocolate cookies. After a brief once over I thought "Why not? I have all the ingredients." When you're in the mood to bake something new....the best recipes are the ones where you have all the ingredients in the pantry....right?

And thus began my Sunday morning.

What a way to start the day.....making cooooooooookies! (there are other good ways to start the day...but this day was made for cookies)

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder (unsweetened)
2 teaspoons cream of tartar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup unsalted butter (I never seem to have this on hand so I used salted butter. And even though the picture only shows 1 stick....I did realize my error and grabbed another stick from the fridge)
1 3/3 cups sugar (divided)
2 eggs
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon chili powder

Preheat your oven to 400' F placing your racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven. (bwaaaahahaha I said racks!!!) Line 2 cookie sheets with parchment paper

In a medium mixing bowl, sift (and for this recipe, I think sifting rather than "whisking" is very important....cocoa powder and other ingredients like to remain lumpy.....and sifting will really break those up) where was I? Oh...sift (i almost typed fist....wtf?) together the flour, cocoa powder, cream of tartar, baking soda and salt. Set aside.

In a larger mixing bowl, beat together the butter and 1 1/2 cups sugar until fluffy....this should take about 2 minutes on medium speed.

Add the eggs and beat until combined.

Turn the mixer speed down to low and gradually (and I mean g r a d u a l l y, I'm still finding cocoa flour mixture in places other than the bowl)  add the flour mixture...beating until combined. Now you will have a bowl of rich, dark cookie dough.

In a little bowl, mix together the remaining 1/4 cup sugar, cinnamon and chili powder.

Get out a tablespoon and scoop out some dough, roll it up into a ball and drop it into the chili mixture

You're suppose to place the balls about 3" apart from each other. I did my best

But I needed to fit them all on 2 cookie sheets...which I did. It actually made the exact number of cookies that the recipe said it would.....amazing!!!!

Bake for a total of 10 minutes.....halfway through the baking time....rotate the cookie sheets.

Well...as you can see, they ran into each other and got kinda crowded. So I ended up with some triangular shapes....square shapes, rectangular....and a few round ones. I think there's a math lesson in here somewhere for some hungry elementary student.

Let the cookies cool on the sheets, on a wire rack for about 5 minutes or so before attempting to remove them. Theeeeeeeeeen, allow to cool completely on a wire wrack.

Then grab a cookie (any shape will do)....close your eyes, put the cookie up to your lips (don't taste yet)...inhale the aroma.... and then take a bite. Now experience the burst of flavors that assault your taste buds.

First the chocolate.....then the cinnamon makes it's appearance and last but not least...a hint of the chili powder, leaving you wanting more...just to make sure you actually experienced all that within a few seconds.

They aren't too sweet....they aren't too chocolately (not that there's any such thing...I'm just saying) and they aren't too spicy. They're just....enjoyable.


Printable Version: Mexican Hot Chocolate Cookies