Potato Chips and Neiman Marcus

Saturday was John's birthday as well as the night he and Erik unveiled the newest murder/mystery game: Church of Our Lady of Interplanetary Ascendence.  In keeping with the "church evening becomes dangerous cult bloodbath" vibe I decided to make some cookies to share.

First I made a batch of potato chip cookies.  I used to make potato chip cookies when I was younger and they even when to the state fair when I was about 13.  I don't recall the recipe I used at that time, but I will be making a point of locating it over the next few weeks when I visit my parents.  For this batch I used this recipe. The cookies turned out fine and the guests seemed to enjoy them (every cookie was consumed by the end of the night), but I think the temperature called for is much too high.  They quickly became deflated, a bit oily, and prone to burning around the edges. 

For the second batch I made Neiman Marcus cookies with some small variations.  First, I used 1 tablespoon of very finely ground regular coffee beans instead of the 1 and a half teaspoons of instant espresso coffee powder.  Secondly, instead of the 1 and a half cups of semi-sweet chocolate chips I used some of the delicious chocolate candy that my mother sent me home with on Easter.  Using a plastic bag and a hammer I crushed one chocolate bar and a few handfuls of pastel M&Ms (some of them contained peanut butter). 

These cookies turned out lovely. 

The evening was fun and the game expertly written.  Sadly, John did not have a chance to eat any of the cookies that I made for his birthday because he was busy acting like a creepy church elder, but I will be taking him out for modern art, fancy cheeses, and wine next week so perhaps that will make up for it.