Dairy free, gluten free dark chocolate almond marshmallow cookies

Life never goes as planned. A phrase that I always loved and believed. And this year so far has once again proved what I believe…well, not in a good way. My husband had a big birthday at the end of April (not saying any number here, but it was one of those big ones ;-)). So from early this year I started planning/plotting a surprise party and a trip. His family in the US was supposed to fly to Hong Kong and show up at his birthday party unannounced. And we would all take a trip to Bali together a couple days later. Obviously something like that is not going to happen for a while. And since we had a ban on gathering of more than 4 people (now it’s changed to 8), I couldn’t even organize a party with friends that we normally have every year.

So I turned to baking again, naturally :-). I was thinking of baking a chocolate cake (his favorite) but I had already done that a few weeks ago, and the idea of having a big birthday cake just two of us seemed a little depressing. That is how these cookies came about. My husband loves soft doughy and gooey cookies (cookie dough is one of his go to comfort foods). And I also had a jar of luscious and delicious almond crème from Almomilk I adore, which was perfect for this recipe. These cookies happen to be dairy and gluten free, and in order to emphasize the flavor of dark chocolate I didn’t add much sugar. They were chocolaty, nutty, delicious and cute, well worth to be hubby’s big birthday cookies if I must say so myself ;-). Another great baked goods that were born thanks to the social distancing.

Makes 9-10 cookies

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Ingredients

• 50g/1.8oz. 70%-80% dark chocolate
• 50g/1.8oz. unsweetened almond cream
• 1 cup. almond flour
• 2 tbsp. granulated sugar, 3-4 if you have a sweet tooth
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1 large egg
• 3/4 cup. marshmallows

Break dark chocolate into small, fairly even size pieces and place in a heatproof bowl. Sit the bowl over a gently simmering water in a pan. I find it easier to control the melting process when the bottom of the bowl is not touching the surface of water. (Yes, I have tried the other way, and it still worked alright. So even if your bowl somehow touched the water, do not panic :-))

Mix almond cream into melted chocolate and set aside.

Sift dry ingredients, except for marshmallows, into a separate bowl. Mix in chocolate and almond cream, and an egg.

Add 1/2 cup of marshmallows and leave the rest for later.

Chill the dough in the fridge for 20 minutes.

Pre heat oven to 175c/347f.

Shape 2 1/2 tablespoon of dough and place them onto a parchment paper. Make sure each cookie has a few marshmallows in it.

Bake for 10-12 minutes, depending on how doughy you want the cookies to be. I baked them for 12 minutes, and got relatively soft center, but I thought I could have done with a minute or two less since I love mine to be quite gooey.

Cool them down for 5 minutes. At this point the cookies are not too hot to touch but melted marshmallows are still warm and sticky enough to act as glue. Stick rest of the marshmallows on top.

Enjoy!