Next week, public schools will let out, and the length of time it takes me to drive to work will be slashed in half. I can’t wait, and while I’m excited for family cookouts and currently loving the sunshine and walks on the trail with the dogs, I feel very much like an adult when I’m forced to come to terms with the fact that the most exciting thing about summer for me anymore is… the traffic. Long gone (ten years gone, to be exact) are the summers that used to consist of sleeping in until noon, picking honeysuckle flowers with mulberry-stained fingers and exploring the woods behind my house. Summertime used to be about dodging poison ivy, catching crayfish in the stream (you have to sneak up on them, make them think you’re going to make a move with your hand in front of them, then swoop in from behind and pinch them right behind their claws) and playing flashlight tag amidst a field of fireflies. Those memories are fuzzy now, like the caterpillars my sister and I used to collect, housing their squirmy bodies in my plastic, purple-topped Little Mermaid aquarium in the back of our swingset-fort.
For the past 10 years, summertime has just meant business as usual, just with hotter days and no snow, and that kinda makes me sad (and a little jealous of my youngest sister who is only 11 and doesn’t have a job to dominate her summer… yet). Feeling very boringly adult, very agitated by my excitement over traffic, and even feeling a little nostalgic, I wanted to make something very nonsensical and fun — something playful this past weekend. These High Hat Cookies (which I keep accidentally calling “Top Hat” cookies and “High Top” cookies) are just that.
Named “High Hat” Cookies after the iconic High Hat Cupcakes, it’s the marshmallow frosting that really makes these cookies so fantastic. Unlike a buttercream frosting (which I tried initially), it is not too sweet. It’s light and fluffy, a slightly sticky, melt-in-your mouth pillowy cloud of homemade marshmallow. Swirl it over a brownie cookie and cloak it in a soft dark chocolate shell and you’ve got yourself a cookie like no other. Crackly, richly chocolaty brownie cookies (some of my favorite cookies; I’ve used them in several recipes, including the ones here, here, and here). They’re chewy (like the corner piece of a brownie <3), deeply chocolaty, and then piled high with marshmallow frosting. Of all of the components of these cookies, the marshmallow frosting is the trickiest. The cookies don’t even require a mixer (you can do all the stirring by hand) and once you pipe the frosting onto the cookies the dipping part is a piece of cake (so long as your chocolate is cool!), but the marshmallow frosting is a bit more consuming. It involves heating your egg whites to dissolve the sugar and then beating on high speed until stiff peaks form. So long as you follow the steps just as written, though, I don’t think you’ll have a problem!
Enjoy, and enjoy your summer as well. Other Recipes You May Like Brownie Cookie Nutella Ice Cream Sandwiches
Peanut Butter Sandwich Cookies
