Starlight Mint Surprise Cookies

Bite into one of these cookies and you’ll hit an unexpected center of melted chocolate mint. Each cookie wraps a tablespoon of vanilla-brown sugar dough around a mint chocolate wafer, completely concealing it. When baked, that wafer softens into a gooey, minty chocolate core that catches everyone off guard.

The dough itself is simple, closer to a sugar cookie than a chocolate chip cookie. That plain, buttery base lets the hidden mint chocolate do all the talking.

Chilling the dough for at least two hours is not a suggestion you can skip. Warm dough sticks to your hands and won’t wrap cleanly around the wafers. Cold dough is firm enough to press and shape without tearing.

A walnut half pressed on top of each cookie before baking adds crunch and a visual cue that something special is going on inside.

Kitchen Tips

• Cover the wafer completely with dough, sealing all edges. Any exposed chocolate will melt out during baking and burn on the cookie sheet.
• Space cookies a full 2 inches apart. They spread more than you’d expect since the wafer melts and expands the center.
• Pull them at golden brown, not dark. The cookies will firm up as they cool, and overbaking dries out the mint filling.
• These are best served slightly warm, when the center is still soft and gooey. Reheat for 10 seconds in the microwave to recreate that fresh-from-the-oven experience.

Variations

• Peanut butter cup surprise: Swap the mint wafers for miniature peanut butter cups and use peanut halves on top instead of walnuts.
• Dark chocolate mint: Use dark chocolate mint wafers for a more intense, less sweet filling.