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Cookies

Chocolate Banana Cream. What’s different about this cookie? That depends. The frame of reference aside, and disregarding how particular I could get, this cookie is dissimilar to any cookies that I, personally, have had previous. This cookie is fluffier and softer than a typical cookie. Not quite a shortbread, but close. The chocolate adds sweetness, but isn’t overwhelming. The cream cheese frosting contributes a nice texture, as well as a delivery platform for the cinnamon sugar that I sprinkled on top. None of the input flavors end up being overwhelming, providing a nice clean cookie with a clean look.

Mix butter, banana, and sugar together in a bowl until creamed.

Optional: crush up some walnuts inside a bag, and add about half a cup into the bowl. this adds a bit of texture/crunch to an otherwise fairly soft cookie. Try them both, see which one you prefer!

Mix in the egg until smooth. Add the vanilla extract. [It should still be very viscous, and not exactly resemble dough yet. don't worry, that comes next!]

Preheat the oven for 350 degrees.

In a separate bowl, mix the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. While mixing, gradually add the bowl to the mixture. Mix until you have a consistent, lumpless dough.

Mold into balls a bit bigger than golf balls. When you set them on the pan, flatten them just a little bit. they should look like this:

They’re not going to melt off too much, so you can place them about an inch and a half apart, and the cookies still won't merge.

Cook for about 14 minutes. Now, my oven runs on the hotter side, so it might be longer for you, but expect it to be in that realm. They should be crisp but have a bit of give. They’ll be on the spongier side.

Wait for the cookies to cool down all the way before frosting them. we do not want our frosting melting onto the cookies. It’s messy, and it’s just not a good look.

While those cool, with a second pan probably in the oven, let’s start on the frosting!

Take the ingredients from earlier, toss them all in a bowl, and mix! It’ll take a bit for it to thicken up, so stick with it! depending on how much frosting you use, you might want to make more, this is just what I used.

Once your cookies are nice and cool, frost the tops in an even and thick spread. you shouldn’t be able to see the chocolate from the cookie through the frosting. Don’t go over the edge, you’ll want something to hold on to when you’re chowing down on your tasty treat later!

Don’t forget your cinnamon sugar! Sprinkle a pinch on top of each cookie, and you’re good to go!

Idea generation for me always starts with two things: What already works, and what I want. Usually, what I want is unrealistic, so a list is created as large as it can be made, with as extravagant of ideas as possible. usually, one of them isn’t as crazy as it may have seemed, and now I’ve found something I actually want to work towards.

The first thing I did was make a list of what already works in cookies. the cookie greats, if you will. Things like peanut butter cookies, crunchiness, sprinkles, frosting, and chocolate.

From there, I devised the similarities between these cookies and determined what made them great. They were sweet, they had a good texture, and there was some firmness to them. Now I knew what I had to work towards.

I started with sweets. What things could i use to sweeten up a cookie that isnt already being used commonly? So, I made a list of my favorite sweets. Saltwater taffy, Gummy bears, candy bars, marshmallows, and nuts. I didn’t know a thing about cooking, so I was using my papa as a resource. He told me that anything gummy, or the likes of taffy, would most certainly melt, and lose that consistency that I love about it. Candy bars are almost exclusively chocolate, which isn't all that different, honestly. I loved the idea of using marshmallows, and maybe even making a smores inspired cookie.

For textures, I love the crunchiness that comes with adding peanut or walnut bits to my ice cream. That sparked something. Ice cream, with marshmallows and nuts. Rocky Road. I would make a Rocky Road cookie! Now I just needed a filler idea for the second one, but I had found the one!

What about fruit? no, I thought, it needs to be refrigerated. bananas dont need to be refridgerated though! what about something like banana bread, or monkey bread? Cinnamon, bananas, and that french toast gooiness. That’ll work for a second one!

I knew from the second I had this idea that this was the one I wanted to do. I already had come up with two variations.

My first idea was simple in its creation. Encase a marshmallow in cookie dough, and cook it. I even had a grand idea to cook it from both sides, using something along the lines of a panini press. I failed to think that it would cook the sides far quicker than the inside, and would end up with an uncooked, charred mess.

Variation two. Wrap each mini marshmallow in dough, then ball all the mini dough balls into one ball, then cook it that way.

THE SECOND HALF OF THE ITERATION SECTION WILL FOLLOW IDEA TEST 2

We tried five different iterations of the marshmallow cookie before moving on to our second idea, which we ended up changing only twice.

Full-sized marshmallow, encased in dough, rolled in pretzel bits. also tried one with walnut bits.

Full-sized marshmallows cut in half, encased in dough, rolled in pretzel, or walnut pieces.

Full-sized marshmallows cut in half, half a werthers caramel placed on top, encased in dough, rolled in pretzel, or walnut pieces.

Mini marshmallows, surrounded by dough individually, then clumped together, and rolled in pretzel bits.

A Werther's caramel placed in the center of a dough ball.

THE SECOND HALF OF THE ITERATION SECTION WILL FOLLOW IDEA TEST 2

It was at this point that we realized we already had so much cookie dough leftover, so me and my knowledgable baking partner, my papa, decided to hijack the dough and use it to make our second idea.

We cut off about 1/4 of a banana, and added it to the dough, the dough was already super thin and soupy at this point, and we knew adding banana would only make it worse, so we added flour to counterbalance it. We threw these in with the last batch of marshmallow cookies, and hoped for the best.

This was the fun part for me. Having my entire family (6 other people), sit down and try all of my hard work. And, getting to try too was a nice bonus.

I created a table to help me decide what I should go with as my final product. there were already some I was very proud of, and didn’t think needed much more work.

As more cookie were coming out, I had an idea. What if, like monkey bread, or a cinnamon roll, we frosted the banana cookies? He helped me put together a cream cheese frosting that could be slathered on top, and, we even decided to sprinkle a little cinnamon on top of the frosting, since there was none that we put in the dough.

It ended up being the fan-favorite by a landslide, followed by the rest of the banana cookies. the only thing any of them noted was that it was really soft, and they liked it.

In the final bake, I added some more crushed walnuts, to give just a little more crunch to the otherwise soft cookie. I was happy with my product, so I packed up the kitchen and came back to campus, cookies in hand.

9/4: Confer with my girlfriend, a legitimate baking connoisseur, about the basics to making a cookie, the ingredients and their ratios, as well as her professional opinion on what sets apart a good cookie from a bad one.

9/5: go to a grocery store and find inspiration for flavors that I like, but perhaps have yet to be implemented into cookies yet.

9/6: mope, for the weekend is approaching and I realize the only cook I know is in Duluth and i have no idea how to bake. call my papa instead.

9/7: travel back to the mystical land of Woodbury, Minnesota, in search of a kitchen with appliances familiar to a simple man like myself. Years of making frozen pizzas have all led up to this very moment. experiment with what little knowledge I have, and have a sugar rush from all the ingredients.

9/8: Wake up in my own bed, and do it all again, assuming I failed to burn the house down the day previous.

9/9: Finish documentation.

9/10: Welcome the criticisms of my peers as I realize, although it won’t make anyone sick, my cookie looks far from appetizing. document the grey hairs coming in.

9/11: Finish the blog. Spend the rest of the day in protest of Jeb Bush. because… why not?

9/12: Make a final, fresh batch of the new cookie, and prep it for presentation.

9/13: donate all my hard work to the university so they can use all my effort to raise money that I will never end up seeing.

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