Gooey S'more Cookie Sandwiches

The world is unfair to s'mores.  There, I said it.  Now it's out in the open and we can talk about it.  S'mores are delicious, everyone loves them, yet somehow they are only eaten once or twice a year when you find yourself near an open fire.  That's just not good enough for me.  I need my ooey gooey s'more goodness all year round!  Enter the s'more cookie sandwich.  Two soft graham cracker cookies, gooey marshmallow filling and a surprise soft chocolate centre. Enough talking ... to the sandwiches! (okay, I meant that to sound like 'to the Batmobile!' but it sounded like I was done talking to the cookies ... which isn't all together untrue)

Ingredients:

Graham Cracker Cookie Recipe: (yields about 30 cookies = 15 cookie sandwiches)

1/2 cup butter at room temperature

1/2 cup light brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

1 cup all purpose flour

1/2 tsp kosher salt

1 tsp baking soda

1 cup graham cracker crumbs (as fine as you can get them)

1 tsp vanilla

2 eggs

1/3 cup white sugar for the cookie tops

Marshmallow Filling

1/4 cup butter

1 cup icing sugar

1 tsp.  vanilla

2 Tbsp.  heavy cream

1  jar marshmallow cream (I used Marshmallow Fluff)

12  roasted marshmallows (details to follow)

Chocolate Ganache

1/4 cup cream 

125 g dark chocolate

Step 1: The butter and the sugar

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.  Cream the butter with the sugars together with a mixer (I use the paddle attachment for this, but use what you have).  You don't have to cream this for too long, just until it's all mixed together.  Creaming for a long time adds more air into whatever you're making, for cookies you don't really need more air ... cakes are a different story.

Step 2: Add the dry ingredients

In a separate bowl, add the flour, graham cracker crumbs, sugar, salt, and baking soda.  Give it a good mix (or better yet, sift the mixture).  Then add it to the butter and sugar mixture.  Mix on low speed and use a spatula to scrape the bottom of the bowl so that everything is mixed.  At this point it will look pretty crumbly ... don't fret, step 3 will take care of this.

Step 3: The eggs and vanilla

Crack your eggs into a small bowl or glass and add the vanilla to the eggs, give it a little mix.  Then add half this egg mixture into your crumbly cookie dough.  Mix on low to medium speed.  Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl with your spatula and then add the rest of your egg mixture.  Mix again on low speed until it's all blended together and it looks like this:

Tip:  Cracking your eggs into a separate bowl will save you from having to fish out egg shells from your dough.  It also is a good way to make sure your eggs look okay before you add them in.

Step 4: Prepare the cookies

Time to bake the cookies.  Take out a plate and add the last 1/3 cup sugar (like in the picture above).  Use a teaspoon or a small scoop to help make sure the cookies are all about the same size.  Roll the dough in your hands to form a ball and then press it to form a disc.  Press the disc into the sugar (just one side) and place it on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper (if you have it) or a silicone baking mat (if you have it).  Once it's on the cookie sheet press the cookie disc down and make it even thinner, a picture of mine are below.  If you don't do this your cookies will be too thick and once you make it into a sandwich you'll have way too much cookie and not enough ooey gooey centre.  

Step 5: Bake!

Bake for 7-8 minutes.  If your oven has a convection fan like mine does, it will be about 6 minutes.  You will see the sides of the cookie turn a little bit brown.  It's better to under-bake than over-bake in this case or your cookies will be too hard and will make it difficult to eat.  Take them out of the oven and let them cool for about a minute before moving them to a cooling rack.

Step 6: Start the marshmallow cream

While the cookies are baking you can get started on the marshmallow filling. Make sure you set a timer for the cookies or you'll get so wrapped up with your delicious marshmallow cream that you'll forget.  Put the butter in your mixing bowl then, with the whisk attachment on, cream the butter.  You want the butter nice and fluffy.  Add the icing sugar and continue mixing.  When it's nice and smooth add the heavy cream and keep on mixing.  At this point you'll basically have a buttercream icing.

Step 7: Roast the marshmallows

Once your cookies are out of the oven, line a cookie sheet with parchment paper and put the marshmallows on it.  Set your oven to 'Broil'.  Put the marshmallows in the oven for about a minute, until the tops are nice and toasted (see my picture below).  Keep an eye on them, they can go from perfectly toasted to burnt very quickly. Take them out of the oven to cool.  You can put another batch of cookies in the oven now if you're not done yet.

Step 8: Finish the marshmallow filling

Add the marshmallow cream to your butter/sugar/cream mixture and mix for a minute.  Put your roasted marshmallows in the mix and keep on mixing.  Once everything is incorporated, it's done (hooray!)

Step 9: Make the chocolate ganache

Since this is only going to be in the centre of the cookies, I used the microwave to make my ganach.  Put your heavy cream and your chocolate into a microwave safe bowl and microwave until mostly melted (about 45 seconds to a minute).  You don't want the mixture to get too hot or your chocolate will burn and nobody wants that. Blech.  Stir the ganache until it's smooth and then leave it at room temperature to cool.

Step 10:  Take a break

Your cookies and your ganache are cooling.  Take about 30 minutes to do something else ... or clean up the dishes if you're so inclined.  Just step away from the cookies, there's nothing more you can do here .... yet.

Step 11:  Assemble your cookie sandwiches

This may be a two person job, so if you have someone around that can help you might want to call them in now.  Put your marshmallow filling and your chocolate ganache into two separate piping bags with whatever sized tip makes you happy.  I used a very small round tip for the chocolate and a medium sized star tip for the marshmallow.  You can pick whatever you like.  If you don't have tips, just cut a small hole in the piping bag and go for it.  If you don't have a piping bag, use a large Ziploc type of bag and cut one of the corners off.

Working quickly pipe a circle of marshmallow filling around the inside of the cookie making sure there is a hole in the filling.  Use your chocolate to fill that hole.  Place another cookie on top.

Tip: this can get quite messy especially if your kitchen is warm. I put a cookie sheet in the freezer and when I was done assembling a cookie I would it in the freezer to keep the marshmallow from spilling out too much.

There you go.  You've now created delectable s'more cookie sandwiches!  Enjoy a sample ... you've earned it! 

This is the scoop that I used to portion out my cookie dough

See?  They're REALLY flat

Cookies fresh from the oven, just a little golden on the outsides ... perfect

My marshmallow army, waiting to be deployed

Bulls eye

Doesn't hurt to offer a little bribe when asking for help in the kitchen

Yes, I love you too  xoxo

COOKIES !!!!!

Just try not to eat one ... I dare you

Things to try:  Add a little peanut butter to the inside of these puppies, if you like peanut butter, you'll LOVE it.  Or just do the chocolate with the peanut butter ... trust me on that one.