The Cookie Dough Lover's Cookbook

Title: The Cookie Dough Lover's Cookbook
Author: Lindsay Landis
Publisher: Quirk Books; Pages: 159
Rating: ZOMG

You've just made a big batch of chocolate cookie dough. You raise the beaters and...  Admit it, you snag a piece of cookie dough, look around to see if anyone is watching, and pop it in your mouth. If you're like this you might do this several times--or just lick the dough right off the beater, spoon, and spatula. Raw eggs be damned.

When I found out that Quirk books was publishing The Cookie Dough Lover's Cookbook I knew that I had to get my cookie dough loving hands on it as soon as possible. When I ripped open the packaging, I literally squealed and then died from overload. Cookie Dough Lover's is an absolutely gorgeous, albeit a bit sinfully overthetop, cookbook that will make you exclaim O-M-Gee with every turn of the page.

A few nights after receiving the book I made the Cookie Dough Cheesecake for my Operation Springform Pan and it was amazing. Rich and delicious. While the recipe took a lot of steps to get to the end result, it was still easy to make. I can't wait to try the cookie dough ice cream and there are also the cookie dough crispy treats, chocolate chip cookie dough bread pudding, cookie dough stuff french toast...you guys, I'm not kidding you. Deep fried cookie dough fritters, cookie dough malts, cookie dough dessert pizza...

I knew before writing up this post I wanted to try one more recipe besides the cookie dough cheesecake. I went with the opening recipe for Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles and Quirk has given me permission to share the recipe with y'all.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles
Makes: 30-40 truffles (I didn't get this many...I assume it was because I cheated a bit...)
Active time: 1 hour
Total time: 2 hours

Cookie Dough:
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed
2 tablespoons milk or cream
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips

Chocolate Coating:
8 ounces dark-chocolate candy coating

Directions:
In a large bowl, beat butter and sugars with an electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes. Mix in milk and vanilla. Stir in flour and salt and mix on low speed (or by hand) until incorporated. Stir in chocolate chips. Cover and chill dough for 30 minutes or until firm enough to handle.

Form dough into 1-inch balls and arrange them on baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Place sheets in the freezer for at least 15 minutes. Meanwhile, melt chocolate candy coating in a double boiler or microwave according to package directions, being careful not to overheat it. Using a fork or dipping tool, dip truffles one at a time in candy coating to cover. Tap fork on the edge of the bowl to shake off excess coating, and return truffles to baking sheets to set.

You can see mine didn't turn out quite as pretty as the ones on the cover (I suspect the cheap candy coating I purchased as my grocery didn't have the 'good stuff'). But. I cannot stress to you how damn good these are. Dangerously good.

 Bottom Line: I'm so glad to have this fun little book on my kitchen shelf. While it might not always be practical, the desserts sure do impress. And if you have better self control than I do, you could just keep these little cookie dough balls in the freezer for a quick fix. Besides the delicious recipes, the layout and photographs are gorgeous. Full page pictures accompany every recipe. My only quip is that the recipes are lengthy and often taken two to three pages, but I suspect that much of this is due to Landis' throughout instructions (as evidenced above). I simply can't rave about this book enough.

 So...are you a cookie dough lover?

A yummy thanks to Quirk for sending me a copy to review. I'm pretty sure that my coworkers send their thanks as well for the treats I've been bringing up to the office. You can find more yummy goodness at Lindsay's blog Love and Olive Oil.

Every weekend, Beth Fish Reads hosts Weekend Cooking.  "Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs."  Hope you'll join the fun!