Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies with Peanut Butter Insides

I love you, Martha Stewart! These cookies are adapted from her 2003 Special Cookies Issue of Living Magazine. If you are a fan of peanut butter and chocolate, you will fucking love these babies. This recipe makes 18 large cookies, 3 inches across and stuffed full of creamy, sweet peanut butter.




What You Need:

• 1 1/2 cups unbleached white flour
• 1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
• 1/2 cup cocoa powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 stick Earth Balance buttery spread (1/2 cup)
• 1 stick Earth Balance shortening or 1/2 cup Spectrum shortening
• 1/2 cup unbleached granulated sugar
• 1 1/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons powdered flax seeds blended well into 6 tablespoons water
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter

What You Do:

1. Mix together flours, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt and set aside.
2. In a large bowl using a mixer or by hand, cream together the Earth Balance and shortening, and both sugars (set aside 1/4 cup of the brown sugar to use later) until light and fluffy.
3. Add the extract and flax mixture and continue to beat until fully combined.
4. Gradually add in the dry ingredients until just mixed.
5. Sir in the chocolate chips.
6. Cover dough and chill for an hour.
7. In a separate bowl, mix together the peanut butter and 1/4 cup brown sugar. Chill.
8. Preheat the oven to 350F.
9. Divide out the chilled cookie dough into tablespoons. I have a small scoop that measures a tablespoon and it works perfectly for this job.
10. Make your cookie bottoms by pressing half of the chocolate scoops into flat discs, with short walls (similar to a thumbprint cookie, but not as deep).
11. Make your cookie tops by pressing the other half of the dough scoops into round discs that are just a bit larger in diameter than the bottoms.
12. Place a rounded teaspoon of the peanut butter mixture on top of each bottom, try to keep it mounded in the middle.
13. Pick up a bottom with peanut butter on it and cover it with a top. Working your way around the cookie, carefully pinch the edges well together to encase the peanut butter. Then carefully smooth over the edges with your hands and flatten them just a bit to make it compact.
14. Bake cookies 9 to a sheet (they spread) for about 12-16 minutes. Let cool five minutes and then transfer to a wire rack.