Chocolate Butter Cookies with Umph!

The other week I made the super simple, super scrumptious butter cookies. I pondered in that post the results with chocolate cake mix. This weekend I found a box of Betty Crocker Chocolate Fudge cake mix in the top of the pantry and I just happened to have a pack of cream cheese in the fridge earmarked for a Martha Stewart Baking adventure. I could buy more cream cheese; I needed to find out if the cookies worked with chocolate.

I set the butter and cream cheese out to soften while I put the Christmas tree together. I then mixed the softened cheese and butter with a glob of creamy peanut butter, a pour of vanilla, one egg and the discovered box of chocolate cake mix. The mixed batter goodness that Thing Two and I had a sample of was then tucked into the fridge the requisite two hours while I figured out the Christmas tree lights.

With the lights aglow and Yoda watching over us I was now ready to scoop and bake. Twenty minutes later I was popping a warm chocolate cookie in my mouth and rolling my eyes back in pleasure. It was good. Very good. 

You couldn't really taste the peanut butter. I think I need to up that factor next time to really get a punch. Perhaps less cream cheese more peanut butter. I'll have to play around with it. Since the peanut butter wasn't overwhelming I thought the cookie could still use some umph to put it over the top.

I remembered my neighbor telling me the original butter cookies would be excellent with a touch of my buttercream frosting on top. I asked my man if he thought eggnog buttercream or Bailey's buttercream sounded better. He chose...

Bailey's! I'd never made such a buttercream so I just set to creaming the butter and Crisco, adding the powdered sugar then pouring in Bailey's a bit at a time until the taste seemed just right. I also added vanilla extract, almond extract and two drops of chocolate flavored oil.

I just did a small pipe of the Bailey's buttercream on half the cookies.

It took an already great cookie up a notch. And they tasted even better the next day.

I have a lot of the Bailey's buttercream left in the refrigerator. I think I see some cupcakes in my future.