I served these cookies at our wedding (~120 people) last winter, and after testing several recipes, mulling over different dessert options, these were the obvious choice to satisfy our range of guests! Everyone (the smart ones) loves chocolate, and because the dough can be made ahead of time, I was able to designate someone as “Chief Oven Operator” to tackle the slicing and baking. As most chocolate based recipes go, I recommend making these a day ahead so as to achieve full potency upon serving! Thank you, Deb, for bringing “peace” to my wedding experience :)

I’m an American living in England, and I brought over my American measuring cups and spoons for situations just like this one. Well worth having a set of cups, as they’re small and cheap and make American recipes a lot easier to follow. I measured the butter by weight (4 oz. is one stick of butter, about 113 grams) and added 3 US tbsp, and it seemed fine.

I am a novice baker, and did all the mixing by hand. I let the butter come to room temperature first, and then I beat it for at least 7 minutes (workin the biceps, aw yeah), until the butter was really soft but not melty at all. Beat the butter and sugar together for awhile, too. Hand mixing made it really easy to add the flour mixture and to mix it just enough to stick together without overmixing.

I used a bar of 85% dark chocolate that I grated more than chopped (it’s pretty cold here and the chocolate decided that’s what it wanted to do). Used dark brown sugar instead of light. The dough was very crumbly and I was worried about consistency but I figured as long as it held together to make logs I’d be okay. I used the plastic wrap to make the logs, putting the dough into the wrap and using the wrap to roll it into log shape instead of touching it too much with my hands. That seemed to work, at least it stuck to the wrap and not my hands. I refrigerated overnight because I didn’t start making them ’til 9pm and I decided I would test my willpower by waiting to bake ’til the next day. After refrigerating the dough was still crumbly but managed to hold for slicing.

The end product was well worth the next day’s arm pain from mixing. Crumbly with bits of chocolate and occasional hits of salty deliciousness. And I felt like a bit of a gourmet being able to make them, woot. Thanks for this outstanding biscuit recipe!