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Classic recipes are always great. What happens when you take a risk and take a blueprint of a recipe and modify it to make something different? Some times it comes out like magic. Other times, it doesn’t work out and that’s ok. I feel like I have spent years perfecting my regular sugar cookies recipe so that I am to the point where I am proud of it and know people enjoy the flavors. I am part of a few cookie and baking groups and have seen people using all different flavors to make their cut out cookies and thought to myself, “I can do that too.” It did require some trial and error, but any time you are creating something new that is how it goes.
This week’s recipe is a Chocolate Sugar Cookie with a Salted Caramel Royal Icing. Chocolate and caramel go together like two peas in a pod. Chocolate is a great flavor that can be paired with so many other flavors. You can make any flavor of royal icing to go with a chocolate cookie. I chose caramel because we are getting closer to halloween and all those candy bar flavors are the vibe right now.
I started by making the cookies the typical way you make a sugar cookie, but I subbed in some unsweetened cocoa powder and added some additional butter. The first time I tried this recipe, I tried using the regular amount of butter that I use in my standard sugar cookie recipe, but it came out a bit dry. Cocoa powder is an extra dry ingredient, so it kind of soaked a bit more of the moisture than I thought it would. Once the dough was together, I started rolling it out so I could cut it into my shapes. This time I used pumpkin cookie cutters. I highly recommend not refrigerating or freezing this dough before you bake it.
After my cookies were completely cooled, I got to icing them. I had to play around a bit with the extract to get the right flavor. Now my extract recommendations are just that, a recommendation. Feel free to add more or less or even swap them out for different flavors. I added my absolute favorite coloring to get some orange and brown for the traditional pumpkin look and got to decorating. In the game of royal icing, consistency is key. Add a little water/extract mixture at a time. I wanted to do the “knit” design on these pumpkin cookies, but added a bit too much liquid and really needed a thicker icing to do that look. If your icing is too thin, just add a bit more powdered sugar to thicken it up again. Just keep in mind, adding to much of one thing will throw off your taste, so just do a little bit.
A couple things I will note, add the salt to taste while making the icing-if you go the salted caramel route. You can also leave out the salt and just have a caramel icing. I will also note that the icing did have a little of a powdered sugar taste at first, but after about 24 hours after icing the cookies, the powdered sugar flavor went away and the caramel flavor was dominate. I have heard that instead of using extracts that flavor emulsions work better, but I have not tried emulsions yet.
I hope you try it out and let me know what you think on social media @emilygetstobaking or in the icons below.
Chocolate Sugar Cookie with Salted Caramel Royal Icing
Ingredients
Chocolate Sugar Cookies
- 1 1/2 cup Salted butter
- 1 cup Sugar
- 1 1/2 tsp Vanilla extract
- 1 Egg
- 2 1/2 cup AP flour
- 1 cup Unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1/4 tsp Sea salt
- 2 tsp Baking powder
Salted Caramel Royal Icing
- 2 1/2 tbsp Meringue powder
- 2 cups Powdered sugar
- 1/4-1/2 cup Warm water
- 1-4 tsp Caramel extract , more if you want intense caramel flavor
- 1/2-1 tsp Vanilla extract
- 1 pinch Sea salt
Instructions
Chocolate Sugar Cookies
- Preheat oven to 350°.
- Measure out your dry cookie ingredients into a bowl. Whisk together to distribute.
- In a mixer on low, cream butter and sugar together until fluffy. (about 3 minutes)
- Add in your egg and extract, mix until combined. Scrap down the side and bottom of the bowl with a spatula to ensure everything is mixed.
- Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients. Just a little at a time until well combined.
- Work dough with hands. On a well floured surface, roll out dough to cut out your cookie shapes. Do not refrigerate or freeze dough.
- On a parchment lined cookie sheet, place cookies to bake. No need to leave a lot of space in-between as these cookies don't spread when baked.
- Baking for about 8-10 minutes, depending on the size of your cookies. I made 4 inch cookies and baked them for 9 minutes which came out perfect.
- Remove cookies from oven and let cool on the cookie sheet for at least 5 mines then move to wire rack for additional cooling.
Royal Icing
- While your cookies are cooling completely, you can make the icing.
- Whisk powdered sugar and meringue powder.
- In a separate small bowl, mix your extracts with your warm water.
- Slowly add the water and extract mix to the powdered sugar mix.
- Mix with a whisk attachment on medium until the frosting becomes fluffy with stiff peaks. Continue to add additional water and extract mix until you get the consistency that you want. Stiff consistency for outlining and patterns, looser consistency for flooding purposes.
- Once you find the consistency you like to start with, fold in your sea salt.
- Move to piping bags for decorating or use an icing spatula to spread icing on the cookies once they are completely cooled.
- Allow about 24 hours for the icing to dry before stacking or packaging cookies. I usually put iced cookies in a single layer in an airtight container.
2 responses to “Easy Chocolate Sugar Cookies with a Caramel Royal Icing”
What a dish with recipe! I will surely try this
These are pure indulgences! Perfect for satisfying those sweet cravings with a touch of elegance. Simply irresistible! 😋🍫🍪👌