Nutella-Stuffed Cookies

Hi everyone! It's been quite some time since the last post. After a busy holiday season, the past few weeks have been spent either working or trying to de-clutter the house. Not the full Marie Kondo treatment, mind you--there is no universe in which I could find joy in Daniel's copy of Resident Evil 2--but several items have had to go, mostly because they were expired. Anyway, the task for today was the kitchen pantry after I had a meltdown over the absolute state of chaos hidden behind that door. I blame the various foodstuffs that try to suicide-dive off the shelves whenever I'm reaching for something.

In the course of the purge cleaning, I managed to find four jars of Nutella, three jars of baking powder, three bags of brown sugar, and a sack of bread flour that I've been trying to use up. A quick Google search led me to this recipe, which I promptly blended with Alton Brown's "The Chewy". Apparently I can't leave well enough alone.

What I will say about the original recipe is that the whole "get the Nutella in the cookie" bit was more complicated than expected. I ended up making something like a cookie cup in order to get it in there and seal it in.

I'm normally a purist when it comes to baking with unsalted butter. Unfortunately, there was a mishap during our last Costco run, and we wound up with, well...Costco amounts of salted butter. Therefore, that was all that I had to work with today. If you're the type of person who likes to lick the beater, you may decide that the dough is too salty as a result. (Yes, this is totally from experience.*) Don't worry! It'll balance with the sweet Nutella by the time that you are done.

*Eating raw or undercooked egg products may lead to Salmonella poisoning. Totally not advocating that you do this...Just blame my lack of self control.

Nutella-Stuffed Cookies
Ingredients:
2 1/2 cups	bread flour
1/2 tsp	baking soda
1/2 tsp	baking powder
2 sticks	salted butter, softened
1 cup	light brown sugar
1/4 cup	pure cane sugar
2	eggs
1 tsp	vanilla
2 T	milk
1/3 jar	Nutella, refrigerated

Directions:
1.	Mix together the first three ingredients in a bowl. Set aside.
2.	Using an electric mixer, beat the butter and both sugars together until the mixture is light and fluffy. Scrape the bowl as needed.
3.	With the mixer running on medium-low, add the vanilla and the eggs in one at a time and mix until just combined.
4.	Add in half of the flour mixture and mix until just combined. Repeat with the milk and the remainder of the flour mixture.
5.	Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate dough for at least 30 minutes.
6.	Preheat the oven to 300 deg F. (Delay this step if you plan to refrigerate the stuffed dough.)
7.	Use an ice cream scoop to form balls of cookie dough. Use your thumb to press into the center of the dough to form a cup.
8.	With a tablespoon, scoop chilled Nutella into the center of each cookie "cup". Press the top of the cup together to seal the Nutella inside. Place the cookies about two inches apart on the cookie sheet, approximately six cookies per sheet.
9.	The original recipe recommends refrigerating for another 30 minutes at this point. I opted to skip this step.
11.	Bake cookies for 20-25 minutes until tops are golden brown.
12.	Remove cookies from oven and place on a cooling rack.

The cookies can be enjoyed while they are still warm and the centers are gooey. Just give it a few minutes to make sure that the cookie sets and the Nutella is no longer molten.