Chocolate Sambuca Crinkle Cookies: 1990s Recipes + Menus : gourmet.com

1990s Recipes + Menus

Makes about2 1/2 dozen

Active time:1/2 hr
Start to finish: 3 hr

ADAPTED FROM KATY MCMASTER, NEW YORK, NEW YORK

December 1999

With an intense anise top note that gives way to a bittersweet chocolate-walnut flavor, these dramatic beauties don’t have the mass appeal of the Mocha Cookies—but if you’re looking for complexity, the crinkles are sure to please.

This is just one of Gourmet’s Favorite Cookies: 1941-2008. Although we’ve retested the recipes, in the interest of authenticity we’ve left them unchanged: The instructions below are still exactly as they were originally printed.

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 oz fine-quality bittersweet chocolate (not unsweetened), chopped
1/2 stick unsalted butter
2 large eggs
1/2 cup walnuts, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup Sambuca or other anise-flavored liqueur
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 cup confectioners sugar

Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Melt chocolate with butter in a metal bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water, stirring until smooth. Lightly whisk together eggs, walnuts, Sambuca, and granulated sugar in another bowl. Stir in flour mixture and chocolate (dough will be thin). Chill, covered, until firm, about 2 hours.
Preheat oven to 350°F.
Sift confectioners sugar onto a plate. Roll heaping tablespoons of dough into balls and roll balls, as formed, in confectioners sugar to generously coat. Arrange balls 2 inches apart on 2 lightly buttered baking sheets and bake in upper and lower thirds of oven, switching position of sheets halfway through baking, until puffed and cracked but centers are still a bit soft, 10 to 12 minutes total. Transfer to racks to cool.

Photograph by Romulo Yanes