These little cookies taste like a cup of peppermint hot chocolate. The slice-and-bake chocolate cookies are thick and soft, and they are filled with a peppermint vanilla buttercream full of crushed candy cane pieces. A chocolate drizzle and a sprinkle of more candy cane makes these cookies look like hot cocoa, too. I used organic candy canes that are free of corn syrup and artificial dyes.

Hot Chocolate Cookies With Peppermint Vanilla Buttercream

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Author: Grace
Total Time: 4 hours (including chilling time)
Yield: 15 cookies 1x

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Description

These chocolate cookies are soft and thick, and they’re topped with a peppermint vanilla buttercream full of crushed candy canes.

Ingredients

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For the Cookies

1 1/4 cups butter, room temperature
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 egg yolks
2 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, melted and cooled
2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup cocoa powder

For the Frosting

1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp peppermint extract
1/4 tsp salt
10 candy canes
2 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, melted and cooled

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Instructions

In a large bowl, use a hand mixer or stand mixer with the paddle attachment to cream the butter and sugar together until very light and fluffy, about 4 minutes.
Add the egg yolks, vanilla, and cooled melted chocolate and beat for 2 more minutes.
In a medium-sized bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, and salt.
Mix together with the stand mixer or hand mixer just until the dough begins to form clumps and come together. Then, use a spatula to fold the dough together until it forms into one ball. It should be thick but spreadable with the spatula.
Transfer the dough onto a piece of plastic wrap.
Form the dough into log shape; use your hands to spread it into a long log-ish shape down the middle of the plastic wrap lengthwise. Then, wrap one side of the plastic over the dough, pull the other side of plastic over that side, twist the ends closed, and roll the log out to smooth the sides into a cylindrical shape. The side it rests on will be flat; that’s okay.
Chill the log of dough for at least 3 hours in the fridge or overnight.
Once the dough is chilled, preheat the oven to 350 F.
Remove the dough from the fridge and let it sit at room temperature for 5 minutes.
Slice the dough into 1/2-inch thick rounds (again, it’s fine that one side is flatter; you can fix it later!).
Place the cookies on parchment lined baking sheets 2 inches apart from each other.
Bake for 18-20 minutes.
Grab a circle cookie cutter that fits around one cookie.
Immediately after removing the cookies from the oven, rotate the cookie cutter around each cookie one by one so that the cookie spins along the inside rim of the cookie cutter and forms back into a perfect circle shape.
Using a circle cookie cutter that’s just slightly bigger than each cookie, place it around one cookie. Use a small circular object with straight sides and a flat bottom, like a soy sauce bottle cap or an olive oil bottle cap, and press it into the center of the cookie to make an indent, pressing only about halfway through the cookie. The edges of the cookie should press into the circle cookie cutter so that the cookie doesn’t crack around the sides. You can use a rounded object if it’s all your have to make an indent similar to that of a thumbprint cookie (see Bake Notes for other options).
Let the cookies cool completely.
Place the candy canes in a large Ziploc bag and seal it shut. Use a hammer, meat tenderizer, or something sturdy with a heavy bottom to crush the candy canes into very small pieces (no bigger than a pea). Set aside 1/4 cup of the crushed candy cane pieces to use to sprinkle on top of the cookies later.
In a medium bowl, add the butter for the frosting, the powdered sugar, vanilla and peppermint extracts, and salt. Use a hand mixer or stand mixer to beat everything together until it forms a smooth, light, and thick buttercream, about 3 minutes.
Add the rest of the crushed candy canes (minus the 1/4 cup that’s reserved), and beat just until incorporated.
Put the icing into a Ziploc bag or piping bag, cut off the tip so the opening is about as big as your pinky finger, and fill the center of each cookie with frosting.
Place the melted and cooled chocolate into another icing bag or Ziploc bag, and cut a very small opening (about as big as the tip of a pen or pencil). Drizzle the chocolate over each cookie.
Sprinkle each cookie with the remaining candy cane pieces.

Prep Time: 30 minutes
Cook Time: 20

How to Make Cookies Taste Like Hot Chocolate

These cookies literally taste like hot chocolate thanks to the mix of cocoa powder and melted chocolate in the batter. The peppermint frosting looks like whipped cream, and the chocolate drizzle makes it feel like a cup of cocoa from a coffee shop. There’s nothing not to love about these cookies.

Bake Notes

You’ll need a large circle cookie cutter, a medium circle cookie cutter, and a small circular object with straight sides and a flat bottom to shape these cookies like I did. These are all useful to make them perfectly circular and with even indents. If you don’t mind them looking (perfectly) imperfect, you can make these without any cookie cutters since they are slice-and-bake cookies. Then, just use your thumb or a tablespoon-sized measuring cup to make the indents right after they come out of the oven.
If you want a really strong peppermint flavor, add up to 2 teaspoons of peppermint extract to the frosting. This is totally dependent on personal preference; just taste as you go!
These will last for 3-4 days stored in an airtight container at room temperature, but they can also be kept in the fridge, if you prefer chilled cookies/frosting.
When you are shaping the dough into a log before chilling it, use your medium circular cookie cutter to ensure the cookies will fit inside this cookie cutter once baked (they spread only a bit). The log of dough should fit inside the cookie cutter with about 1/8 inch of wiggle room.