July 2009 Daring Baker Challenge: Mallows

The July Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole at Sweet Tooth. She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network.

This was my first Daring Baker Challenge, and I was so excited to discover on July 1 what mysterious item I would be baking. I wasn't disappointed. I have been needing an excuse to try making marshmallows for quite some time. I was surprised how easy they were. I guess I knew this, having read other articles on marshmallow making (notably Mollie Weizenberg's article in Bon Appetit last summer: here is her recipe which I will soon be trying. Well, maybe I will wait for fall...

These cookies were a little labor intensive, and I did use an 1 1/2 inch cookie cutter, and had many many more than the 2 dozen the recipe said would result. Not that I'm complaining, mind you. I just wish it were Christmas time so I had more people to give them away to. July isn't really the time to have way too many chocolate covered anythings laying around...

I think next time I would be a little more careful piping the marshmallow clear to the edge of the cookie. I will say that the recipe was well written. Many times when you follow component type recipes, you end up with way too much or not enough of one of the components. These worked out pretty much perfect, just a little extra chocolate glaze, and that can't be a bad thing.

I dipped them at night. Note to self: figure out how to take better digital night time photos. I usually just wait for daylight, since I don't have good lighting in the kitchen at night, and nothing looks quite right after being snapped...

The shortbread cookie bottom was really good, very neutral, but well designed to complement the marshmallow and chocolate coating. The only other problem I ran into was that the chocolate coat did not ever really harden up. I ended up just leaving them in the fridge, where they happily remained hardenedand chilled until they were gone. I would have preferred them at room temp, however. Either way, these definitely shouldn't be eaten while wearing anything white.

I also discovered that these are beyond delicious if you spread them first with peanut butter before eating them...No pics of that though, too too messy to shoot one handed!

I can not believe that August is just around the corner. Another July escapes and fall is breathing down our necks. Now that I'm obsessively canning, I look forward to a month of tremendous garden windfalls, and if that fails, tremendous farm market windfalls...

If you are at all interested in canning, or even just toying with the idea of starting out, please visit Food in Jars. I promise you that you will be instantly inspired. I just finished canning some pickles this afternoon, 11 pints I'm proud to say will line the basement shelves for the coming months. I'm sure some photos will follow later.