Walnut Chocolate Hearts

Since Valentines Day is coming up soon I thought I would make some Valentines Day cookies. When I read the recipe to these it sounded so good and I thought they looked really pretty too. This recipe makes about 4 dozen cookies, takes about 2 hours, and wasn’t too hard to make. I did have a few problems with the recipe. First, I didn’t have chopped walnuts so I had to chop them myself, and then, I didn’t have a rolling pin so I had to improvise. In case you don’t have a rolling pin you could do what I did. I took an empty wine bottle from my dad, cleaned it and used it as a rolling pin, and it worked perfect. I also put some wax paper on top of the cookie dough when I rolled it out because when I didn’t have it on, the dough would break apart and wouldn’t roll out as smooth.



Ingredients
1 cup butter, cubed
2/3 cup packed brown sugar:
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg, lightly beaten
2-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
¼ cup baking cocoa
½ teaspoon salt
¾ cups finely chopped walnuts

Topping:
1-1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
2 tablespoons shortening
½ cup ground walnuts

Directions:
• Combine butter and brown sugar in saucepan. Cook and stir over medium low heat until butter is melted. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Cool for 15 minutes and stir in egg.
• Combine flour, cocoa and salt, and add to butter mixture. Then, fold in walnuts
• Cover and chill for 30 minutes or until easy to handle.
• On a lightly floured surface, roll dough to ¼ inch thickness. Cut with floured 3 inch heart shaped cookie cutter. Place 1 inch apart on ungreased baking sheets. Bake at 350 degrees for 9-10 minutes or until edges are firm. Remove to wire racks to cool.

• For topping, in microwave melt Chocolate chips and shortening on low heat, and stir until smooth.
• Dip half of each heart into chocolate mixture. Allow excess to drip off.
• Dip edges of dipped side into ground walnuts. Place on wax paper, let stand until set.