Chocolate Reese's Malted Whopper Drops (My Spin on Dorie Greenspans Cookies)

So I've seen all over the place (the food blog world) that this week everyone made Dorie Greenspan's Chocolate Malted Whopper Drops for the Tuesday's With Dorie recipe and as I'm about to join TWD, I was a little bummed that I'll miss this one.  I love this cookbook, Baking From My Home To Yours and am excited to join in the weekly group and make lots of the recipes in the book! 

I decided that even though I am not officially part of the TWD bakers, that I would make the Whopper cookies anyway and then I saw at the store the newer Reese's Whoppers that are peanut butter flavored.  Hmm.  It sounded like a fun thing to try.  I knew that Dorie's recipe had Whoppers and chocolate, so I thought I'd do the Reese's Whoppers and Reese's peanut butter chips.  Um, hello--can you say--YUM!  Obviously, the peanut butter and chocolate was a great combo!  The malt is SO good and the peanut butter, well, divine!  I was really hoping these Reese's Whoppers were good, and they really are, so I chopped them the same as the recipe suggest with the chocolate Whoppers and only made a few changes to the recipe.  Ya gotta try these!

Here's the recipe as I made it, but you have to get this cookbook for hundreds more delicious recipes by an amazing baker!

Reese's Malted Whopper Drops  (adapted from Dorie Greenspan's Chocolate Malted Whopper Drops)

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 cup Carnation Malted Milk Powder

1/4 cup Hershey's unsweetened cocoa powder (plus I added 1 tablespoon Hershey's Dark cocoa)

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup plus 3 tablespoons (11 tablespoons) unsalted butter, room temperature

2/3 cup granulated sugar

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1/4 cup whole milk

2 cups Reese's Peanut Butter Whoppers, (each cut in half)

1 cup Reese's peanut butter chips

1-1.55 oz. Hershey's milk chocolate bar, chopped (I just added this for kicks)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line baking sheets with parchment paper.  Set aside. 

In medium sized bowl, add flour, malt, cocoa, baking powder and salt.  Whisk together to sift.  Set aside.

In bowl of electric mixer, combine butter and sugar.  Beat on medium speed for 3 minutes to cream together until smooth.  Scrape sides of bowl.  Add eggs one at a time, beating for one minutes in between each addition.  Add vanilla and beat well.  Scrape sides of bowl again.  With the mixer on low, add half the dry ingredients, mixing just until incorporated.  Add milk and mix until combined.  Then add the rest of the dry ingredients and mix until just incorporated.  Stir or fold in Whoppers, chips and chocolate with a rubber spatula. 

Drop cookies by tablespoonsfuls onto baking sheets.  Bake for 9-10 minutes.  Let the cookies rest on the baking sheets for two minutes before removing them to wire racks to cool.  (I only baked half the batch for now and that was 28 cookies, there's still at least that much to go!)  Make these with the idea of giving lots of them away in mind!

Some of the malt in the Whoppers turns to a yummy crispy almost caramel-like melty yumminess.  I'm not sure how else to put it.  Again, if you love pb/chocolate combo, you'll love these!

On another yummy note, I tried the brownie mix with pumpkin puree as I mentioned I would in my last post and well, they are tons better for a brownie than using the cake mix.  I seriously cannot even tell that these brownies are not just made according to the package directions with all that egg and oil!  I have stumped lots of people who also couldn't tell what the secret ingredient is.  So, if you're ever in a pinch OR are trying to save on some fat and calories, make brownies using a quick mix in a box and 1 cup pumpkin puree (for a 9x13 pan)  They are fudgy and moist and delicious!  I cut these in to little one inch square pieces, so lots of people could try them at a church meeting.  These were the Pillsbury traditional fudge brownies with walnuts that I made in an 8x8 inch pan and used 1/2 cup pumpkin.  I mentioned in my last post, but you just bake them 5-7 minutes less than the package suggests.  The ones with the candy corn on top I made using Pillsbury traditional fudge brownie mix for a 9x13 pan and used the one cup of pumpkin.  Of course, the best test is to insert a toothpick and when it comes out clean, they are done.  Go have a brownie!