Chocolate Peanut Butter Rabbits

The smitten kitchen cook book has an amazing peanut butter and chocolate sandwich cookie recipe in it. The only problem with it, which is, not so much a problem, as a matter of preference, is that the cookies are sandwiched so high that it is hard to get ones mouth around them. These cookies are also extremely rich, and two peanut butter cookies sandwiched together with a thick layer of chocolate and peanut butter ganache tends to err on the side of just a tad bit too much. As my mental tug-a-war proceeds between the epic flavors of a Reese’s peanut butter cup in cookie form and the gluttony of eating an entire cookie sandwich, I hit upon the idea of making the individual peanut butter cookies and then giving each of them a quick dip into a vat of chocolate ganache -an extremely satisfying solution.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup (1 stick) Butter (room temp) + 1 tbsp Butter
1 cup Peanut Butter
1/2 cup Brown Sugar
1/2 cup Sugar
1 Egg
2 cups Flour
1/4 tsp Baking Soda
1/4 tsp Salt
10 oz semi-sweet Chocolate finely chopped

Directions:

Beat the 1/2 cup of butter until it is soft and fluffy.
Beat in the peanut butter.
Beat in the sugars.
Beat in the egg.
Combine all of the dry ingredients together, before incorporating them into the butter mixture. The dough will be crumbly, but get it as well combined as possible.
Wrap the dough in wax or parchment paper and chill the dough in the refrigerator for at least an hour.
Preheat the oven to 350 F (~177 C).
Roll the dough out between two pieces of parchment/wax paper. The dough will still be a little crumbly in places, so just roll out the dough as best you can, and then press it back together and re-roll it after you have extracted the cut cookies.
Cut out the cookies using a cookie cutter.
Arrange the cookies on greased or parchment lined baking sheets.
Bake for ~10 minutes.
Allow the cookies to cool.
Melt the chocolate and 1 tbsp of butter in a double boiler.
Dip the top’s of the bunnies in the chocolate, and then set them aside to dry.