Where to stick the creative kisses?

[reannd]

I've been procuring small samples of all the funky new hersheys kisses with the hopes of making a kiss cookie platter. Got some mint, almond, candycane, peanut butter, caramel, coconut, hugs, kissables, and dark all lined up and ready to go.

Anyone have a low-butter (& low shortening) recipe I can stick this variety of kisses into? I would normally just use pb, but that won't go so well with the minty or coconut varieties. Next stop was chocolate base, but to tell you the truth I'm not a huge chocolate person, especially chocolate-flavored cookies (the kiss will be more than enough chocolate for me).

That leaves me w.vanilla. Would a normal sugar cookie recipe work? Anyone got anything more creative?

[alysonlaurel]

I think a normal sugar cookie would be good, and I also think they could be creative. You could play with extracts a little bit. You could use an almond extract for the coconut, orange extract with the almond ones, or whatever else you came up with. I assume you're making several batches, so it wouldn't be too hard to divide and flavor differently. They wouldn't be full-flavored orange or almond or whatever cookies, but they'd have something different in the background.

[reannd]

Cool, thanks! I think doughy sugar cookies could work in extracts by hand. Never thought about orange, though.. I'm really excited about that one!

I also considered green tea powder for some of them.. but the pb would be a little wrong=)

[alysonlaurel]

No problem! I'm so pleased with both our ideas that I think I might make some myself, as my boyfriend keeps staring longingly at the flavored kisses every time we go grocery shopping.

[janeh]

My first thought is to find a thumb print cookie recipe that you like and replace the jam with a kiss. Hmmm....I think I better go get some of those kisses and give it a try.

[dolores]

'procuring'? I'd love to hear more on that.

Why not the usual peanut butter kiss cookies?

I think a giant variety of kisses in those cookies would blow everyone away.

Kisses now come in coconut?? The peanut butter are still by far my favorite.

How about the cherry cordial, have you seen those?

What a cool idea.

[reannd]

Thanks all-

I find myself lucky (?) that folks @ my work are experimental w.their candy selections they leave at their desks to share. I often get to 'try before i buy'. ;) I don't like cherries & chocolate, but I did acquire one of those for my husband ;)

What we ended up doing was a batch with half peanut butter + dark chococlate (I like those enough to keep them on hand), and another with just sugar / almond base that we did roll in the follwing: cinnamon, green tea powder (mixed w.sugar), hot cocoa (wasn't as good as it sounds), mint cocoa, orange zest, and coconut flakes. We didn't put kisses in all those, but we did end up with quite a fun variety of cookies from one batch of 'sour cream cutouts' (my favorite not sugary, chewy, sugar cookie) after adding crystallized ginger & mint m&ms to the other section of our kiss-less batch =)

I kind of wish I got some of those candy cane kisses at halloween time. Now I need someone to go out on a limb & pick up those 'elvis' reese cups. Have you seen those? (filled with pb & banana cream? I can't decide whether i should buy one myself.. seems a little funky).

[dolores]

Mmmm, PB and banana cream in chocolate? I'm not fond of the chocolate quality of Reese, otherwise I would try it. Now if the Hershey folks came out with same in a kiss!

What did you use for your cookie base, reannd?

And what nice folks you have at work!

[ArikaDawn]

Supertaster reviewed the Elvis Cups if you're curious.
http://www.chow.com/stories/10714

[dolores]

Thanks for the pointer, ArikaDawn, I had never gone to Supertaster before.

[Chris VR]

Elvis Reese's Cups- not good. The banana taste has a weird sharp artificial note to it.

[reannd]

thanks for the reviews. i am also not a fan of reese (love the idea, thumbs down on execution) - which i was waiting for my free sample!

i used a sour cream cutout recipe i posted uh, here => http://www.chowhound.com/topics/464780

s'good. not too sweet.. if you want sweet, roll them in sugar =)

[girlwonder88]

That recipe looks really similar to one of my favorites-love it. So, a question. Did you do these like thumbprint cookies, with the kiss stuck on top, or like the more traditional pb kiss cookie, with the kiss hidden inside?