Chocolate Peanut Butter Shells

I saw this recipe a couple weeks back, via the one and only Tania's blog, My Journey: Adventures of a Vegan, and I'd been fantasizing about it for weeks, and yet somehow not finding time to actually TRY the recipe out.

But lo and behold, on Sunday God created chocolatey-peanutbuttery goodness, and it was good.

I brought these into work on Monday, after trying to control myself so that I didn't eat a ridiculous amount of them Sunday night, and they went very quickly. E has concluded that these may be his new favorite cookies, and my boss came back for seconds about five minutes after FIRSTS and without even having to be encouraged to do so.

So yeah. Make these. They'll make your squishy little tumbly happy.


INGREDIENTS:

Dry:

• 1.5 c. flour


• 1/2 c. baking cocoa


• 1/2 t. baking soda

Wet:

• 1/2 c. margarine, softened


• 1/2 c. sugar


• 1/2 c. brown sugar, packed


• 1/4 c. soy milk


• 1 t. vanilla

Peanut Butter Filling:

• 1/2 c. sifted powdered sugar


• 1/2-3/4 c. peanut butter- chunky is great!


• 1/3 cup chocolate chips

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 350. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

In a small bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder and baking soda. In a large bowl beat together margarine, sugar, brown sugar. Add milk. Beat well. Gently mix in the flour mixture about 1/3 at a time until incorporated.

For the filling, combine powdered sugar and peanut butter in a mixing bowl and beat until sugar is absorbed and peanut butter feels stiffer. Add chocolate chips. It should be a pretty solid mixture because you want to form it into little balls. If it’s still oily or thin, add a little more powdered sugar.

Using a piece of dough just a bit smaller than the size of a golf ball, flatten the dough into a disc on a piece of parchment paper. Place a heaping teaspoon of the peanut butter mixture on the center of the dough. Carefully fold chocolate dough over the peanut butter ball and seal the edges. Roll dough into a ball. If the dough gets dry, add a splash of milk to moisten it.

Place balls on baking sheet, seam down, about 1 inch apart. Bake for about 8-10 minutes, until the surface begins to slightly crack. Let cool for 2 minutes on the sheet then transfer to cooling rack.

Makes about 2 dozen.

*The dough should be similar in texture and malleability to Play-doh.

(from Squirrel's Vegan Kitchen)