Maple Cream Cookies

Did you know that tomorrow is Maple Syrup Saturday? It's true. A few weeks ago I googled "food holidays" and so many came up I started laughing. Food on a stick day? Waffle day? And those are just a couple for March!

Maple Syrup Saturday stood out to me, probably because the day before a friend of mine had requested "cookies like those maple ones at Trader Joe's." Have you ever had those cookies? They sell a version at the dollar store too, as well as some grocery stores. They are shaped like a maple leaf and filled with maple cream filling. They are sweet, delicious, addicting, and downright dangerous. (It's easy to eat 3 or 4 or 5 or...in one sitting.) I did a little online research and found some recipes to try. I ended up adding a few things to both the cookie and frosting recipes to make them more like what I wanted.

You'll notice my cookies are round and not maple leaf shaped. I don't have a maple leaf cookie cutter. Do you know how hard it is to find a maple leaf cookie cutter in March? It's not still winter anymore right? There is no snow falling anywhere. No one still wants to eat comfort food. I guess I better go shopping for my fall cookie cutters in July. (I know I could have gotten it online, but I wanted the cookies now. Once she mentioned those cookies I had to have them!)

These cookies are very good. You'd think they would be overly sweet, but they aren't. If you don't want to sandwich them you can put the frosting on top of each individual cookie. The star of this recipe is the frosting. I want to make it again, soon. I already have a few ideas for it. One involves muffins. I'll keep you posted!

So enjoy some maple syrup this Saturday! Make some pancakes or waffles or make these cookies. I know I'll be making at least two one of those!

Maple Cream Cookies

Printer-Friendly Recipe

For the cookie:

Ingredients:

1 cup butter, softened

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 egg

1 cup real maple syrup

1 teaspoon maple extract

2 teaspoons baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

4 cups all-purpose flour

Directions:

1.       Preheat oven to 350°. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper or grease them.

2.       Combine the flour, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl and set aside.

3.       Cream the butter and brown sugar with an electric mixer. Add in the egg, syrup, and maple extract and mix until well blended. Mix the dry ingredients into the wet carefully to avoid wearing your flour. Beat until just combined.*

4.       Shape into 1 inch balls (about 1 tablespoon each) and place on cookie sheet. Try to make the balls the same size so they will match up well for sandwiching. Flatten slightly with the palm of your hand or the bottom of a drinking glass.

5.       Bake 8-10 minutes, rotating the pans halfway through baking. Let cool completely before frosting.

*At this point, if you’re lucky enough to have a maple leaf cookie cutter and wish to use it, refrigerate your dough until firm enough to roll (probably about 1-2 hours). Use flour to help you roll out the dough and cut out your cookies. If your cookie cutter is not symmetrical, be sure to flip it over to cut half the cookies or flip the cut-out over on the baking sheet (so the cookies will match up when sandwiching them).

For the icing:

Ingredients:

8 tablespoons butter (1 stick), at room temperature

2 cups powdered sugar

4 tablespoons maple syrup

¼ teaspoon maple extract

1 tablespoon whipping cream

Directions:

1.       Cream the butter with an electric mixer. Slowly add in the powdered sugar until combined.  Mix in the maple syrup and maple extract. Add the cream and beat until combined and smooth.

2.       Turn half of the cooled cookies upside down. Frost the bottom half of the all the cookies and then sandwich them with the top of the cookie. When I started out I was not using a lot of frosting and then went back and filled them more when I realized how much I had left. You will use about a teaspoon per cookie.

Yield: about 40 sandwich cookies or 80 stand-alone cookies

Source: Cookie recipe adapted from Allrecipes.com. Frosting recipe adapted from I Dream About Food.