Triple Coffee Cookies

Ingredients

The key flavor in these triple coffee flavored cookies comes from, of course, the coffee and espresso beans:

• espresso powder: you can find this espresso powder in most grocery stores. Don’t use regular ground coffee, because it won’t dissolve like instant coffee.
• coffee liqueur like Kahlua adds coffee flavor.
• adding crushed chocolate-covered espresso beans for coffee bean cookies means even more coffee flavor and a bit of crunch.

How to use coffee in baking

Drop cookies and other recipes typically made without liquid ingredients use espresso powder or instant coffee for coffee flavor.. You can see other examples in this coffee and walnut pound cake or in my coffee truffles.

You can add more coffee flavor to baking recipes with a coffee liqueur. While you probably think Kahlua is only for yummy cocktails like a creamy espresso martini, you can use flavored liqueurs wherever you use vanilla extract (which at 35% alcohol by volume is essentially a liqueur). I use liqueurs in my sugar cookies, Grand Marnier in my orange muffins and orange chocolate cake, Chambord in my raspberry loaf cake, Frangelico in my Nutella blondies, and amaretto in my Bakewell blondies. And, yes, I definitely like my cocktails!

If a cake is made with milk or buttermilk, you can replace that with brewed coffee or espresso like in my triple layer chocolate cake and peanut butter drip cake. Or use brewed coffee in a coffee syrup to soak the cake layers of a tiramisu cake or the Biscoff cookies in a Biscoff tiramisu.

Variations and substitutions

• Sub in vanilla or another liqueur for the coffee liqueur in this coffee cookie recipe.
• It would be sacrilege in my house, but you can leave out the chocolate chips for a purer coffee flavor.

About drop cookies

Drop cookies are a classic in baking because they are generally quick and easy, whether you’re making chocolate chip cookies, peanut butter chocolate chip cookies, butterscotch cookies, or chocolate drop cookies. Fancy for drop cookies is when you coat the cookie balls in powdered sugar to make brownie crinkle cookies or ube crinkles.

Simply mix together the ingredients, scoop or spoon dough onto a baking sheet, and bake. Or, even better, scoop your drop cookie dough balls and freeze them. That way you can bake one or two at a time whenever you’re in the mood for a cookie!

Step by step

Step 1: Heat your oven to 350°F (175°C) and line two baking sheets with parchment paper or a silicone mat.

Step 2: Combine the all-purpose flour, espresso powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a small to medium-sized bowl. Whisk them together and set the bowl aside.

Step 3: Cream together the softened butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar until light and fluffy, about 3 to 5 minutes. This will provide some mechanical leavening, so keep beating!

Step 4: Add the egg and coffee liqueur to the butter and sugar mixture and beat on medium speed for one minute.

Step 5: Add in the crushed chocolate-covered espresso beans and beat on medium speed for another minute to further break up the crushed coffee beans. In initial versions of this recipe, I added the crushed coffee beans with the chocolate chips, but my taste testers didn’t like the larger chunks of coffee beans in their cookies.

Step 6: Add the dry ingredient mixture to the wet ingredients, mixing on low until the cookie batter is just combined. Be careful not to over-mix your cookies, or this will develop the gluten in the flour and make your cookies tough!

Step 8: Using a cookie scoop or a spoon, drop 2 tablespoon portions of dough onto the prepared baking sheet, spacing them about 2 inches apart if you are baking them right away. I love my #40 cookie scoop, which scoops not quite 2 and a half tablespoons of cookie batter.

Step 9: Bake for 10 to 12 minutes until the edges are set or slightly longer if you are baking the cookie balls from frozen. The espresso cookies will be soft in the center and slightly brown around the edges.

Recipe FAQs

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