{DBC} florentine cookies

Part 2 of the Daring Baker's February Challenge: Florentine cookies! Part 1 was a panna cotta with a balsamic strawberry compote, the recipe for which can be found by clicking the link.

Initially, it made sense to me. Panna cotta, classic Piemonte dish, Florentine cookies, presumably from Florence, Italian theme. Not so. These cookies allegedly come from Paris, France. Though, I've also heard that they come from Tuscany, so everyone could just be confused.

Which is fine, because they are deeeeeelicious. They're crispy, light, and actually work well alongside the denser panna cotta. I sandwiched mine with melted chocolate, but I like them pre-chocolate very much as well. Perhaps in future I'll just do a lattice drizzle, or leave them chocolate free.

Florentine Cookies
Adapted from The Daring Kitchen

You'll need:

• 2/3 cup [about 10 tbsp] butter
• 2 cups rolled oats
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 2/3 cup flour
• 1/4 cup dark corn syrup
• 1/4 cup milk
• pinch of salt
• 1 tsp vanilla

• 1 1/2 cups bittersweet chocolate

Preheat the oven 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. [note: do NOT substitute with aluminum foil - you need the parchment paper.]

In a medium saucepan over medium flame, melt the butter. Remove pan from heat and stir in oats, sugar, flour, corn syrup, milk, salt, and vanilla. Drop small balls of dough, about a tsp, onto baking sheet 3/4 inch apart, and flatten slightly with the back of a spoon. Bake for 6-8 minutes until edges are golden brown. The cookies will spread out during baking, so be mindful. Let cool at least 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack and let cool completely.

Meanwhile, melt chocolate. Once cookies are cool, spread a thin amount of chocolate on the flat side of one cookie and sandwich it with another. Or, pipe chocolate artfully over the tops of the cookies without sandwiching them. It's really your prerogative here.

In other news, I've eaten so much this weekend I could explode. I haven't experienced food coma in quite some time now, and let me just say, I haven't missed it. Not that it wasn't all delicious, of course. Just...

Let's just say it hasn't been one of my smarter food weekends.

Hopefully it'll wear off when I go to bed.

That is, if the oh-so considerate folk on the bottom floor decide not to turn the base up to absurd levels at bizarre hours of the morning and give me an unappreciated wake-up call.