Chocolate Covered Ritz Peanut Butter Cracker Cookies

It’s Memorial Day. And it’s almost 10pm, which means writing this blog on a Monday night is no different than a Sunday. Anyways, I love a good long weekend. Especially when it is the official start to summer. And while mother nature was clearly not onboard the summer train this weekend, all in all it was a very nice and relaxing weekend down the Cape. I was looking for some cookie inspiration on Sunday afternoon so went to one of my favorite places on Main Street in Chatham — Chatham Candy Manor. They are notorious for their delicious fudge, but I went in looking for all things chocolate covered. I was considering some chocolate covered blueberries or chocolate covered cayenne, but my friend Sarah came across these chocolate covered Ritz peanut butter cracker sandwiches. We were drooling over the case when the lady next to us was like “HAVE YOU EVER HAD A CHOCOLATE COVERED RITZ CRACKAH? YA GOTTA TRY IT.” So we did. And then we immediately went to the grocery store and bought a box and made some cookies.

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We barely made it to the car before we had to bit into these.

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Ingredients:

  • 2 sticks butter, softened
  • 3/4 cup light brown sugar
  • 3/4 cup granulated sugar
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 1/4 cups flour
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips
  • 70 mini-Ritz Bitz peanut butter sandwiches
  • coarse sea salt

Step 1: Melt the chocolate chips over low-heat until creamy, stirring constantly. I burned the first batch of chocolate per usual so microwaved the second batch. I mixed in about a tablespoon of peanut butter into the chocolate, but that’s an optional step. I just had it ont he counter so figured why not. Take about 70 of the mini Ritz Bitz PB sandwiches and pour them right into the  bowl of chocolate and gently cover them using a spatula. On a parchment-lined baking sheet sprayed with non-stick spray, spread out the chocolate cover bitz and put them in the freezer for at least an hour. I counted out 80 but we definitely ate 10 of them before they made it into the batter.

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Step 2: Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Cream together buter and sugars until smooth. Add in the eggs and vanilla until well incorporated. Sift together the dry ingredients, and add to the wet mixture. Refrigerate the dough for at least 20 minutes.

Step 3: Take the chocolate covered bitz out of the freezer and break into smaller pieces. I recommend chopping them on a cutting board and not taking the lazy way like I did and thinking the mixer will break it up. Mix for about 2 minutes or until the chocolate covered bitz are well incorporated into the dough.

Step 4: Scoop even-size balls of dough onto the sil-pat or parchment-lined baking sheet. Top with a dash of coarse sea salt. Bake at 375 degrees for about 8-10 minutes, or until golden brown.

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I’m glad we took the advice of the lady in the candy manor because she was 100% right about how delicious a chocolate covered Ritz cracker is. These are also pretty soft and airy which is nice because when you get a good chunk of cracker its crunchy and salty.

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There was some much-needed TV and sleep time this weekend. And of course some good eats and shopping. My friend Sarah also ran her first 5k which was a lot of fun. I’ve done the Hyannis Memorial Day weekend race every year since 2008, first starting with the half-marathon in 2008, then realizing that was too much running, and I’ve done the 5k ever since.

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The sun did not make an appearance on the lake until I was leaving at 7 this morning, but even the cloudy view was not a bad one this weekend.

Cloudy all weekend …

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Sunny this morning …

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I spent my afternoon today in the backyard for a mini BBQ with some of my girl friends. I am starting to get the hang of this grill thing. I was going through a phase where I was setting off an indoor smoke alarm even though I was grilling away from the house, and then burnt my fingers off by touching a pizza stone if it was hot. Not the smartest, but I’m getting better. Happy summer everyone!