December 28, 2019

Andes Candies Cookies

Hi everyone! I hope you all enjoyed a joyous Christmas this past week! If you’re like me and LOVE Christmas and never want it to end, here’s a classic Christmas cookie recipe to keep the festivities going: Andes Candies Cookies!

These soft little cookies are rich and chocolaty with a lovely mint twist on top. As an added bonus, (assuming the batch doesn’t disappear instantly 😉 ) they can even be used for a crust in my Egg-Free Chocolate Peppermint Cheesecake! Since I planned to make said cheesecake for the Utke family Christmas last Sunday, I got together with my sister, Lauren (from Lauren and the Foreign), the week prior for a little baking extravaganza.

To make Andes Candies Cookies egg-free, I use cream cheese as a substitute. It’s not the most universal egg replacement, but it sure seems to work well in cookies by binding the dough and making it nice and rich. I also used Enjoy Life Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips which are free from the most common allergens.

After melting the butter, sugar, and water on the stove, I stirred in the chocolate until it melted. I allowed it to cool for a few minutes before mixing in the cream cheese, baking soda, salt, and flour. Then I covered the dough and allowed it to chill for 30 minutes in the fridge.

The chilling can reduce spread when baking and can help for rolling the dough into balls. Personally, I prefer making little cookies, so I made my dough balls no bigger than a ping-pong ball. Also, if you want to have thinner cookies than the ones pictured below, you could press down the dough before baking.

Right after the cookies come out of the oven, top each one with half of an Andes mint. As it starts to melt, take a small offset spatula or the back of a spoon and swirl the chocolate around. If you make larger cookies, you’ll likely want to use a full mint per cookie. After about 10 minutes, the cookies can be transferred to a cooling rack as the chocolate hardens. Enjoy!