A coffee lover’s must! These coffee-infused chocolate cookies have a wonderful chewy texture with a surprise toffee crunch. Serve with a hot beverage or a scoop of rich vanilla ice cream for a decadent dessert.

After a very successful try at coffee-flavored ice cream, I had wanted to use coffee in other desserts, but to achieve a really rich coffee flavor, I learned that I had to steep a lot of beans. The problem is we had shipped up just enough beans for our required morning brew. So, coffee flavors were put on hold until a recent trip to Anchorage where I had an opportunity to pick up some organic coffee extract. I was hoping it would provide the same rich flavor as steeped beans. It did! Just one and a half teaspoons of extract turned really good cookies into great cookies. The addition of the toffee crunch sent the confection over the top. These cookies could be gussied up with a dusting of powdered sugar or a drizzle of melted chocolate. But those additions are unnecessary in an already perfect recipe.

Mocha Toffee Bites

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup butter, softened
• 1/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips
• 1 1/2 tsp coffee extract
• 1/3 cup granulated sugar
• 1/3 cup packed brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1  1/2 tsp coffee extract
• 2 tbsp plus 2 tsp dutch processed cocoa
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/3 cup English toffee bits

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. In a double boiler, melt chocolate and butter. Stir until smooth. Set aside.
3. In the bowl of a stand mixer, mix together sugars and egg. Beat until smooth.
4. Add vanilla and coffee extracts. Beat until well mixed.
5. Add cocoa powder and salt, beat until well mixed.
6. Mix in chocolate-butter mixture from double boiler.
7. Mix in flour and baking powder.
8. Stir in toffee bits.
9. Drop dough by rounded tablespoons onto parchment-lined sheet, at least an inch apart.
10. Bake in preheated oven for 8 – 10 minutes.
11. Let cool for a couple of minutes on sheet. Then transfer to wire rack to completely cool.

Yield: about 15 cookies