Candy Bar Cookie Cups

Luckily, my weekend visit to Indiana coincided with the monthly dinner club meeting. I posted HERE about dinner club last summer. A group of our college friends formed this club that meets for themed dinners in which each couple contributes a dish or two. Once a month, our friends gather together to catch up, reminisce, swap stories about our growing families, pour drinks, sample the recipes, and laugh into the night. My husband and I live too far away to make a regular appearance so it's always a treat when we can make it back for one of these parties.

I realized that no one was bringing a dessert to this meeting around the time my car crossed the Indiana State Line on Friday night. While I am usually happy to make one more recipe, I knew that Saturday would be a busy day filled with preparing for a scheduled Pampered Chef party, presenting the cooking show, cleaning up, and making the two appetizers that I had already planned to bring to dinner club. I needed to find a recipe that was quick and easy, yet spectacular. These decadent cookie cups certainly fit the bill!

I adapted this dessert from a recipe for Secret-Center Cookie Cups that I had seen on the Pillsbury website. Using prepared cookie dough, bite-sized candy bars, and frosting from a tub, these were so fast and simple to make!

First, I unwrapped 24 bite-sized Snickers bars. You can use any bite-sized, chocolate-covered nougat and caramel candy bar for this recipe. Then, I divided a tube of prepared peanut butter cookie dough into 24 pieces. I pressed the candy into the cookie dough in the palm of my hand, then rolled the dough between my hands to cover the candy bar and form a ball.

I dropped the dough-covered candies into my mini-muffin pan and baked for 10 minutes at 375 degrees.

Remove the muffin pan from the oven and place on a cooling rack. While still warm, use a mini-tart shaper to make an indentation in the top of each cookie cup. Then take the cookie cups out of the tin and place on a the rack to cool completely.

To finish, I used my Easy Accent Decorator to pipe prepared chocolate fudge frosting onto the top of each cookie cup.

• Candy Bar Cookie Cups adapted from Pillsbury.com
• 1 roll refrigerated peanut butter cookie dough
• 24 miniature milk chocolate-covered nougat and caramel candy bars (about 1-inch square), unwrapped (I used Snickers)
• 1 container (1 lb) chocolate creamy ready-to-spread frosting

DIRECTIONS

Heat oven to 375°F. For each cookie cup, wrap a heaping teaspoonful cookie dough around 1 candy bar, enclosing it almost completely and forming a ball. Place the cookies in a mini muffin pan. Bake 8 to 12 minutes or until golden brow. Gently press a shallow well into the center of each cookie cup using a mini-tart shaper. Cool 1 minute. Remove to cooling racks. Cool completely, about 15 minutes. Spoon about 3/4 cup frosting into an Easy Accent Decorator or a pastry bag with a star tip. Pipe frosting on top of each cookie cup.