Cookie Contest - Sweet Heat Salty Bacon Buttons

MLK COOKIE CONTEST CONTINUES!


The second selection that I am posting for the cookie contest comes from one of our regular commenters, Dave.

Many of you might know 
Dave as "A Year on the Grill" and/or ERecipeCards. He has supplied a fabulously different cookie. Sweet, salty, and wow!  


And they’re gluten-free. Way to go, Dave. 


And they only have 4 ingredients.  Double-wow. 


Espresso coffee, cayenne pepper, bacon, and chocolate.

What's not to like about bacon?

I used Ghirardelli's 60% chips. 

SWEET HEAT SALTY BACON BUTTONS

Ingredients

1 bag “dark chocolate” chocolate chips

1 STRONG shot of espresso

1 pound thick cut bacon (Fried, dried and diced)

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Directions

Melt the chocolate (Microwave in short bursts, stirring in between). [Note: I used a 70% setting.)

Add the Espresso Shot and mix well. (Note: a shot from my espresso machine was about 4 tablespoons of coffee. I would bet you could make some strong coffee as a substitute, if you don't have an espresso machine.)

Line up tiny cupcake papers (candy-sized) and add 1/2 teaspoon of melted chocolate in the bottom of each paper.

Add a tiny (and Dave means tiny) pinch of cayenne spice to the top of each.  Not enough to change the taste to a pepper chocolate, but just enough to add an interesting taste.  About 1/4 of a normal pinch is plenty. [On the right is a picture of a teaspoon of spice on the espresso coffee plate.]

Top with 1 teaspoon of crumbled crispy bacon and press into the chocolate.

Dave didn’t say how many this made. My batch made: 3 dozen.

You do not have to bake.  Again, how cool is this?!

Allow the sweets to cool and, as Dave says, watch as the "traditional" sugar cookies sit there while these become the life of your party!

Now, I will admit that these sound a bit more like “candy” since there is no flour involved, but…who cares. Brownie, candy, bar, cookie. They’re all bite-sized desserts.  You be the judge.


Also, baker's note: I noticed that the chocolate was hardening between batches (I could only put 12 liners into my tray at a time), so I re-microwaved the chocolate for about twenty seconds each time. This made the chocolate a little soft, so the second and third batches needed a longer time to cool. I put them in the refrigerator, and they cooled faster.

Dave has provided a great demo of these delights on his Dave’s ECardRecipes website. Here’s the LINK. 

JUST FOR FUN...being the "cheese" lady, I made the last few of these, substituting Parmesan cheese for the bacon, and then I did a few with bacon AND Parmesan. Yum. Just a twist.

P.S.  BOTH DAVE AND MY COOKIE CONTEST FINALIST FROM LAST WEEK, DENISE, HAVE WON SOME SWEET COOKIE CUTTERS FOR BEING FINALISTS!  [DAVE, if you see this message and miss all the others I've sent, write me.  Avery at averyaames dot com  DENISE, yours are in the mail!]

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And watch for CLOBBERED BY CAMEMBERT, coming out February 2012.

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