Wednesday, September 19, 2012

UnReal Cookies

I'm not sure how many of you have seen the new candy in the candy isle yet, but UNREAL is a candy I can get behind and fully support (this from a non-candy eater). First off, no artificial colors, second, no artificial flavors. . .NO corn syrup, and no preservatives. It's all REAL. The story behind the brand is actually pretty cute.
So, when I happened to receive a coupon for a free bag of chemical free candy, I took a lunch-time stroll to CVS and found some. There are 5 variations that are UNREAL versions of M&Ms, Peanut M&Ms, Snickers, Reese's and something with nougat, I really don't eat candy that often, so I'm not sure what it's supposed to be, maybe a Heath bar???
 
 
Once I had the candy in hand, I thought. . .why eat just candy, when we could bake something fun?
 
After some googling, I found a yummy looking recipe on one of my new favorite blogs, you can refer to How Sweet Eats for the full recipe. I found it interesting how similar it was to a cookie I made last summer from the Brown Eyed Baker, especially with this cookie tearing technique, but more on that a little later. . .
First, assemble your team: eggs, brown and cane sugar, vanilla, butter, flour, baking soda, and the star of the cookie, UnReal candy coated chocolate pieces.
 


Start off by melting the butter, then let it cool for 10 minutes or so.
 
Next, find a sous chef and have her whisk both sugars (I reduced the sugar a bit, only 3/4 cup of brown sugar and 1/3 cane sugar) in with the melted butter. . .

Add the egg, egg yolk and vanilla, have the sous chef continue to whisk. . .

 
Add the flour and baking soda, when it starts to look like this, it's easier to switch from the whisk to a spoon or spatula.


Finally, add your UNREAL candy, you'll notice the colors are a little different than what you may be used too, but that's because it's all made with natural colors from beetroot juice, turmeric root extract, purple cabbage juice, don't those sound better than Blue #40 and Red #5???? Beets, turmeric and cabbage are all items found in your local produce section. . .ok, stepping off the soapbox, back to cookie making. . .

Doesn't this look good?

 Now comes the fun part, and sadly, since my sous chef is still too little to take pictures with my DSL, you'll have to rely on my description. First, use a small cookie scoop (if you don't have a cookie scoop, I recommend you get one, but in a pinch, it's a little more than a tablespoon. Now, instead of just plopping the dough on a cookie sheet, take the dough in your hands, and pull it in two, you should notice a choppy texture in the middle, then rotate and press them together. The two blogs I mentioned above had different techniques at this point. How Sweet Eats put one on top of the other, Brown Eyed Baker presses them side by side. I took a hybrid. I didn't like them directly on top of one another, but if you look at the dough balls below, you will notice one is slightly on top of the other, this helped the cookies remain some height instead of flattening out like a typical all butter cookie.

The other tip I have for these is to wait a few minutes from the time you finish mixing and when you start making dough balls. The consistency of the dough became slightly rougher between my first and second batch because it sat for about 10 minutes first. I think this made it easier to work with, so in the future, I will wait a few minutes before dishing out the first tray.

Next, preheat your oven to 325, and cook for 8 - 12 minutes. Typically my convection oven cooks fast, but I actually keep these in for 10 minutes. I like my cookies lightly cooked, if you like them more golden, you will definitely want to go with the longer time.

While you wait, it's a good idea to start on the dishes. . .
 
Sticking your tongue out is a proven technique in dish doing. . .


Pour yourself a glass of milk so it's ready. . .


After 10 minutes. . .YUM!






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