homemade thin mints

Welcome to the happiest day of my life. Just kidding... sort of. When it's girl-scout-cookie season, thin mints have always been/will always be my go-to cookie. When I met up with my friend Anna (who I haven't seen since Greece!), I was happy to learn that she works for Vegetarian Times (she's also a SF chef as well as a chocolatier!) and tests recipes. I was even happier when I found out that she recently worked on recipes from BabyCakes' new book, BabyCakes Covers the Classics. And then I was ecstatic to see that she had extra frozen dough from when she tested a homemade thin mints recipe.

As we prepared the dough for the oven and waited for the chocolate-covered pieces of heaven to cool, the one word that seemed to be floating around was "impatience." We wanted these bad. Somehow we managed to let the chocolate melt completely, let the cookies cool (almost) completely, and let the chocolate-dipped cookies harden (so what if we used the freezer instead of the fridge) before we ate them. The patience was hard to come by, but it was so, so worth it.

homemade thin mints
from BabyCakes

1 1/2 cups Bob’s Red Mill All-Purpose Gluten-Free Baking Flour
1 cup vegan sugar
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 cup arrowroot
1 1/2 teaspoons xanthan gum
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup melted refined coconut oil or canola oil
1/3 cup unsweetened applesauce
2 tablespoons vanilla extract
1 cup vegan gluten-free chocolate chips
3 tablespoons mint extract

Preheat the oven to 325°F. Combine the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, arrowroot, xanthan gum, baking soda, and salt. Add the coconut oil, applesauce, and vanilla and mix until a thick dough forms (it will be a little crumbly). Form small dough balls and place on a lined cookie sheet-- each 1 to 1 1/2 inches apart from one another, flattening each ball and smoothing the edges. Bake for 7 minutes, rotate the pan, and bake for another 7 minutes. Let stand on baking sheet for 10-15 minutes.

Meanwhile, melt chocolate and mint in a double boiler (or a metal boil on top of water boiling in a pot). When completely melted, remove from heat. Dunk cooled cookies in mint chocolate and place on a cooling rack. Once all dipped cookies are on the rack, place them in your freezer for 15-20 minutes, until the chocolate has hardened.

You're welcome.