Peppermint Puffs

Okay, after a short hiatus, lets get back to it - because nothing says “the holiday season” like having too many cookies and still deciding to bake MORE.

I’ve been making these peppermint puffs for years and they never disappoint. Super light and fluffy, they’re like little peppermint pillows that melt in your mouth. But, a word of caution before you proceed: if staying away from things like trans fats is really important to you, even for things such as very special cookies, choose another recipe because these contain shortening.

Now, I’m not one to pretend cookies are healthy. For real, the amount of butter, flour, and multiple forms of sugar I take to the BJ’s checkout counter every December is obscene. However, everyone has to draw the line somewhere and, for me, that line is usually some combination of shortening and/or artificial food dyes. This recipe contains both of those ingredients. Rats.

But I’ve been making these cookies for so long that we had no idea how bad shortening (ie: the purest form of trans fat) or artificial food colorings are for us when my obsession with these cookies started. Once word got out that these things were very, very bad for you, I tried to modify this recipe to be more in line with my others - offensive in the amount of butter, sugar, and flour in them but at least devoid of manufactured chemicals.

Shortening is used in baked goods for two reasons: 1) it’s more shelf-stable than butter, and 2) it gives things like cookies an irresistible fluffy yet chewy consistency. This recipe calls for Butter-flavored Crisco, so I figured substituting equal amounts of real butter would change the consistency but otherwise result in the same cookie I loved so much. But I was very, very wrong.

You see, I’m a recipe follower, not a recipe creator. My secrets lie in my techniques that I use on other people’s recipes but I would have no idea how to create my own. What I didn’t realize in switching out shortening for butter is exactly how much it would change these cookies. The result was a delicious but super greasy and super crumbly cookie. Again, delicious, but falling apart on the cooking rack. Fail.

But, don’t worry, I didn’t have to throw that whole batch out. On Christmas Eve, I delivered them (crumbled, in a gallon-sized Ziploc baggie) to one of my very best friends for whom my Peppermint Puffs are her favorite part of my holiday cookies - first, I gave her the pretty basket of cookies, then I handed over the contraband. She will remain nameless to protect her identity because I’m pretty sure she licked every last crumb out of that baggie. And I love her even more for it.

Anyhoo, I decided at that point I was okay with having one cookie in my holiday cookie arsenal that broke all of the rules. Sometimes, you just have to love a cookie for what it is. Kinda like humans :).

step 1: gather your ingredients

We already discussed the shortening (at length) above - Butter-flavored Crisco can be found in the baking section of your grocery store. I find it’s usually on the bottom shelf. Figures.

You have a couple different options for your crushed peppermint - you can manually crush up either candy canes or round peppermint candies (the kind your grandmother carried around in her pockets, you know the ones) OR purchase pre-crushed peppermint candy. I’ve done both in the past so if you go for convenience I won’t judge.

Pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees and get this party started,

step 2: crush your peppermint

If you chose to go with pre-crushed peppermint, you can skip over this step completely. Lucky duck!

Otherwise, remove you candy canes or peppermint candies from their wrappers and place in a quart-sized plastic baggie. Take a meat mallet (or use the bottom of a glass) and crush those bad boys up. Keep in mind, this can be a loud process, so maybe don’t do it after your kids have gone to bed. That was my first mistake… Also, make sure you crush them up pretty finely. More on that later.

You know you remember your grandma pulling one of these out of her pocket, possibly along with a questionably crumpled tissue…

My crushed candies in a quart-sized baggie. Yours should be more finely crushed than mine were.

step 3: combine your wet ingredients.

In a large bow or mixer bowl, beat Crisco and sugars together, scraping down the bowl as necessary. This isn’t a very big recipe so, unless you’re doubling it, you’ll likely have to scrape down the bowl a couple of times here to really get it all combined. Beat in the egg,

Perfectly combined - now, these sides need to be scraped down!

step 4: mix in dry ingredients

In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. Add these dry ingredients to your wet ingredients in several parts, beating together until all of the dry ingredients are incorporated before adding more. With your mixer on low, add crushed candy and mix until just combined. This dough is pretty crumbly, just FYI.

The final dough. It’s much crumblier than the dough you’re probably used to working with.

step 5: bake your cookies

Line your baking sheets with parchment paper that has been cut (or folded under) to just fit the bottom of your baking sheet. I always use parchment paper to make my life easier but it’s usually not necessary, as greasing the pan would work just as well (just requiring more elbow grease to clean when you’re finished). In this recipe, however, parchment is NOT OPTIONAL. Trust me on this one - without the parchment, you cookies will fall apart before you can even get them off of the cookie sheet.

Using a 1” cookie scoop, scoop up your dough and place about 1 1/2” apart on your baking sheet. Because this dough is crumbly, you’ll need to really pack it into your cookie scoop so that it doesn’t fall apart. The easiest way to do this is to get what seems like too much dough in your cookie scoop, press it against the side of the bowl, and then scrape away any excess.

Additionally, the cookie scoop mechanism will break your dough ball apart a bit in the process of getting it onto the baking sheet. Just take your fingers and press it all back into place. Alternately, scooping the dough up using a spoon and rolling it in your hands to make your 1” cookie dough balls would work, too.

Bake your cookies for 11-12 minutes, or until you can just barely see a hint of browning on the underside edge where the cookie sits on the baking sheet. Let cookies rest on the baking sheet for 1-2 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack. Use a spatula for this - the melted candy will still be quite hot and you really need to get under it to make that transfer cleanly.

Really pack that dough into your cookie scoop or squeeze it really well in your hands.

This is what the cookie scoop will do to your dough ball…

… so push it back down with your fingers to make sure it all bakes evenly.

I got creative with my cookie spacing this time. It made me really happy.

step 6: repair your cookies

You may have thought you’d end up with perfectly round cookies, but you’t be mostly wrong. Some of them will indeed be perfect, but melted candy has a mind of its own - and, if you didn’t chop your peppermint candies finely enough in the beginning, you’ll have more spreading than otherwise. Not to worry, though - all is not lost! Wait for your cookies to cool completely, then gently break away any rogue melted candy bits to reveal the beautiful, round peppermint puffs you intended to make. They’re under there, they just need a little TLC to make them shine. Again, kinda like humans :).

Some are perfect, some are not.

This one is not salvageable. You’d might as well eat it before anyone sees it…

Now this one, this can be fixed! Just wait for it to cool, then gently snap off the rogue candy pieces.

Same cookie, just a few minutes later :)

Mistakes Made…

These little guys are pretty hard to mess up if you follow the instructions. The one thing I should have done differently? I should have taken more care to crush my peppermint candies up more than I did. You don’t want them to be all powder, but they should be pretty finely chopped.

In my defense, I was trying to do this right after my kiddos went to bed, which was a bad decision. In our home, we have one simple rule for nighttime noise: You wake ‘em, you take ‘em! Since I did NOT want to be dealing with any of that, I tried to get through my candy smashing portion of this recipe as quickly as I could… with predictable results. Not that this changes the end result, it just means the cookies spread more. They’re still freakin’ delicious!

Enjoy, my friends :)