I’ve been sent by a few friends a cookie challenge to make Twix cookie bars that they have seen pop up on Pinterest. I’m not really big into making bar cookies, aside from magic cookie bars. So I did a lot of recipe research today and combined a few different ideas to create these Twix cookies. I also did not have powdered sugar so I had to improvise the shortbread recipe a bit. All they really are is a shortbread cookie base, some softened caramel on top, and then a chocolate coating.

These cookies are a more-time consuming venture than I like, but that’s what Sunday experimenting is for. I was happily impressed with the finished product and I think my coworkers are in for a sugar-high double-cookie Monday.

Shortbread Ingredients:

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 2 1/4 cups flour

Caramel Ingredients:

• 1 cup (about 15 individually wrapped caramels)
• 4 tablespoons of heavy cream

Chocolate Coating:

• 2 cups milk chocolate chips (semi-sweet works if you have those instead)
• Coarse Sea Salt

Shortbread Instructions:

Step 1: Beat together butter and sugar. Add in vanilla and mix well.

Step 2: Mix in flour.

Step 3: Separate the dough into two even size amounts and roll them into logs. Then cover the logs in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 2 hours. If you’re in a hurry, you can freeze them for 30 minutes.

Step 4: Once the dough is chilled, slice into even 1/4 inch size cookies. Bake at 375 for 7 to 9 minutes. Mine seemed to take about 10 minutes. You want the shortbread firm but not brown at the edges.

Step 5: When the cookies come out of the oven, transfer them off of the cookie sheet onto either a cooling rack or foil. You want to make a small indent in them so that the caramel has a place to settle later in the process. I used my pointer finger and pretty much burned it off, so you can do that or use the  back of a small teaspoon.

Step 6: Make the caramel filling. There are variations on how you can do this, but I went for the simplest possible. I had some Kraft caramel pieces left over, so I took about a cup (maybe 15 total) of unwrapped pieces and put in a small pan over medium to low heat.

Step 7: Add in 4 tablespoons of heavy cream. All of the other recipes called for more caramel and less cream, but I was just focused on getting the right smooth consistency, so this is what worked well for me. Make sure you are constantly stirring and the heat isnt too high. I switched from a wooden spoon to a fork to really integrate the cream into the caramel.

Step 8: Using a small spoon, spread a dollop of caramel into each indent of the cookie. After I used up all the caramel, I spread it around on the cookie to cover the entire amount of shortbread on top. You could also dip these directly in the caramel if you wanted, but I’m guessing you’d have some pretty burnt fingers early on and go back to this method.

Step 9: Once you’ve spread the caramel around every cookie, transfer them to a parchment lined sheet and put in the freezer for 20 minutes so that the cookies and caramel harden.

Step 10:  Take the cookies and spread over a cooling rack. Then melt 2 cups of milk chocolate chips in a pot over medium heat. Focus on constantly stirring otherwise the chocolate will easily burn and there is no way to save it.

DO NOT DO THIS: (try to multi-task with work and chocolate melting). This batch was a burnt chocolate fail.

DO THIS: Melt chocolate chips over low heat and keep stirring. Luckily I had extra chocolate chips on hand.

Step 11: Using a small spoon, spread a thin layer of chocolate on top of each cookie. This method lasted about 4 cookies before I got impatient and just started dipping the cookies into melted chocolate. My fingers are a little burnt but it was worth it. I had thought about covering the entire cookie in chocolate, but thought that might be too much. Also it was 11pm on a Sunday and I wanted to just finish these up in the simplest yet more delicious way possible.

I’m starting to notice I might be getting manicures too frequently, considering my nails are professionally polished a different color everytime they make an appearance in these blogs …. which is about twice a week.

Final step, sprinkle with a dash of coarse sea salt while the chocolate is still soft!

And there you have it. Delicious homemade Twix cookies, better than the candy bar! You can either eat these right away with the melted chocolate or put them in the fridge for an hour or so until the entire cookie hardens. I’ll let my trusty coworkers be the official judges of how these turned out tomorrow morning, but I think it’s safe to say I will have some pretty happy coworkers in the morning …. sugar crashing in the afternoon.