Father's Day Cookies (2 of 3)

I'm sorry that this is a little late... I spent lunch on Friday typing something brilliant... and then I forgot to email it to myself to retrieve and finish later... So I had to start over. I hope this is almost as good... 

Sometimes growing up is hard. But I learned a lot from him as I grew up - Dads are great at that. I learned how to dance by standing on his toes at Father-Daughter dances in elementary school. I learned how to make pancakes, and have been hopelessly addicted ever since. I learned jokes, that no one else gets, and how to crack myself up (he still gets me hook-line-and-sinker, though...). I learned how to ride a bike, how to drive a stick, and how to pan for gold. I learned that mustaches can be cool, Saturday mornings belong to "This Old House", and manly men can still cry now-and-then.

I saw him cry at my Bat Mitzvah, and then got me almost as messed up as my mom next him with moose ears (more on that later). He got just a teensy bit choked up at both high school and college graduations, and at our wedding, he was the only man crying almost as much as Jason. And that's okay - because I love them both. He's always there to talk things through, and he handles my "crazy" girl moments pretty well, and helped me learn how to handle myself.

 And, above all, I learned that Oreos are, like, the awesomest cookie, like, ever. And, I learned by myself, that if you search the web for a homemade Oreo recipe, the only one you will find is from Smitten Kitchen. Seriously - this woman is amazing. I'll probably have to do a whole post dedicated to her awesomeness, but I digress. The only posts I found out there for homemade Oreos, were either hers, or other people posting about how awesome her recipe is. I was a little wary about her caution about the sweetness - so I did use just one cup sugar, I used salted butter instead of unsalted, and I rounded up the salt added. These came out just a teensy bit salty with that, but none of my tastetesters seemed to mind :-) And I'm always over critical of my own baking. But the filling tasted EXACTLY as if you scraped it out of an actual Oreo. My only advice to you: Make. These. Cookies. Om nom nom. Oh, and she says that the recipe makes over 2 dozen sandwiches. I'm not sure how this is true. At all. I got maybe 18, and I made the cookies smaller than she said. And the filling just barely filled the 18 cookies. That is the only untruth that Smitten Kitchen as ever spread.

For the cookie:

1 1/4 cup all purpose flour

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup sugar

1 1/4 stick butter, room temperature

1 egg

For the filling:

1/2 stick butter, room temperature

1/4 vegetable shortening

2 cups powdered sugar

2 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. I was able to use two racks (and rotate trays halfway...).

Whisk together dry ingredients, then beat with butter and egg in electric mixer until combined in doughy goodness. It will be thick. 

Take a small cookie scoop and make little dough balls on cookie sheets (parchment is helpful) and put them about 2 inches apart (these do spread a little). Use wet fingers to flatten just a teense. Bake for 9 minutes, rotate halfway. Cool on racks.

 To make the cream, place butter and shortening in a mixing bowl, and beat until combined. Add in the sugar and vanilla, and whip together on high for about 2 minutes, until fluffy.

Put the cream in a pastry bag with a small tip (or, a plastic bag and cut the corner off). Match up the cookies with similar sizes, and squeeze some cream onto a cookie. And press the other cookie on top!

 Voila! Cookie sandwich! Repeat with lots of cookies.

Dunk in milk, send to dad, bribe coworkers, or make new friends. Because seriously. Like whoa.

COOKIES?!?!?