Butterscotch Marble Blondie Drops

Taking every advantage of opportunities to bake, I decided to make some cookies for a meeting today. My workplace cannot has the inability to function without food during meetings, so lunch is always catered in if the meeting gets anywhere near the 12 o'clock hour. Why pay for cookies if I can bring them in...thus satisfying my baking obsession without being stuck with 2 dozen cookies at home, taunting me.

For Christmas I received Big Fat Cookies, which I love. These cookies are perfect for meetings, to ensure that whatever I bring in can stand up to the jumbo-sized cookies we would otherwise order. Fast and easy, this recipe turned out to be a great weeknight baking project - the dough didn't need to be chilled and the chocolated swirled in perfectly. The recipe claims you'll get 2 dozen out of this, but I got about 15 and I felt like I did a (fairly) good job of measuring these out. The dough is pretty sticky though, so there's only so much you can do to get 3 even tablespoons-worth of dough per cookie.

Butterscotch Marble Blondie Drops

from Elinor Klivans' Big Fat Cookies

4 ounce semisweet chocolate, chopped

2 C unbleached all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1 C unsalted butter, softened

2 C packed light brown sugar

2 tsp vanilla extract

3 large eggs

Melt chocolate in a double boiler until melted and smooth. Set aside.

Sift flour, baking powder, and salt into a medium bowl and set aside. Beat together the butter, brown sugar, and vanilla until smoothly blended, about 1 minute. Add the eggs and mix until blended.

On low speed, add the flour mixture and mix until incorporated.

Drop heaping tablespoons (about 3 level tablespoons each) of dough 3 inches apart onto parchment-lined baking sheets. Drizzle about 1/2 tsp of the melted chocolate over the top of each cookie. Use a small, sharp knife to gently swirl the chocolate through the cookie to marbleize.

Bake the cookies in a 350-degree oven until edges are brown, about 11 minutes. The tops will still be a little soft. Let cool on baking sheet for 10 minutes, then use a spatula to transfer to a wire rack to continue cooling.

*Note: The chocolate had hardened up quite a bit by the time I was ready to drizzle over the second cookie sheet, so I had to reheat. I would probably wait and melt the chocolate after making the dough, not beforehand.