Cookie Dough Truffles

Stop what you are doing and make these right now! Eat a few, then give the rest away. People will love you .. if they are human and love chocolate. K? Mkay. So now that you are back and have many more friends than you thought you did, let me tell you my little story with these .. and melting chocolate. And if you can't tell from my picture I made one batch slightly pink with two drops of red food coloring because a friend just found out she is having a baby girl!!! I couldn't find white mini chips so the regular chocolate had to do. No complaints so far.

I love to bake for the holidays. I have never had much success as I do not own a double boiler. People have said, "oh just use a bowl and place it on top of a boiling pot of water" but that makes me so nervous about cracking the bowl. You see, a long time ago while dating my husband I thought I would make him fondue cheese in the ceramic pot. It cracked on us in the middle of dinner and scared me so I totally freak out any time I melt chocolate or anything similar.

This past holiday season I found a new trick! I figured out I could put chocolate in a heat proof bowl on the defrost setting and that would melt it perfectly! Worked like a charm! The only problem!? I still buy the chocolate chips and not the regular chocolate that melts thin and is better for things like this. See, I like a thin layer of chocolate rather than a thicker coating. Usually it goes on so thick I need like 3 packages of chips for two dozen buckeyes or in this case cookie dough balls. So if you learned a lesson from all this: BUY REAL CHOCOLATE for dipping!

Also as another tip: Do NOT use wax paper. It will stick to your truffles, buckeyes, etc. If you just put them onto a cookie sheet they pop off just fine once refridgerated.

Cookie Dough Truffles

Adapted from: Annie's Eats, originally Taste of Home

8 tbsp butter, room temperature

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 can sweetened condensed milk (14 oz)

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips

1.5 cups semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate, for dipping (chopped)

mini chocolate chips, for garnishing

Combine butter and brown sugar in mixing bowl with hand mixer until light and fluffy. Beat in half the flour, then condensed milk and vanilla and mix well. Then add the other half of the flour. Mixture will thicken. When combined well, gently beat in the 1/2 cup of the mini chocolate chips. Refridgerate dough for 10-15 minutes so it can harden.

Once hardened, roll into desired sized balls placing on a cookie sheet and placing in the freezer to harden for at least 1 hour. After hardened, begin to melt chocolate in double boiler or stove top in heat proof bowl atop pot with boiling water. Once melted, begin to dip choclate balls with a toothpick into the chocolate compeltely covering them. Allow to drip excess chocolate for a few seconds and return to cookie sheet and immediately garnish with mini chocolate chips as desired. Return to fridge to cool and set.