Chubby Hubby Cookies

Ben & Jerry's has this ice cream flavor called Chubby Hubby:

Chubby Hubby® - Fudge Covered Peanut Butter Filled Pretzels in Vanilla Malt Ice Cream Rippled with Fudge & Peanut Butter

It began with two office jokesters' pulling a prank on a colleague whose endless tales of his love for Ben & Jerry's made them nuts. They hatched an imaginary batch packed with pretzels, peanut butter, & fudge in vanilla malt ice cream & spread a rumor of a brand new Ben & Jerry's hit called "Chubby Hubby". After searching obsessively he was crushed when the hoax was revealed, so the jokesters home-made a pint. He proclaimed it too good to be a joke & after one taste, so did we. The rest is history. Chubby Hubby -- it's no joke!

I had a whole bag of pretzels leftover from when I made Pretzel Chicken Tenders and needed something sweet with which to end my (Belated) Valentine's Day At Home Bravo! Italian Cucina Dinner.  Joelen took inspiration from a pretzel based chocolate chip cookie recipe she found and then created this magical Chubby Hubby inspired cookie!

These cookies took a little getting used to as it looks like a regular chocolate chip cookie but has that slight twist to it from the pretzels.  Once you ate a few though they're quite addicting!  The pretzels lended the cookie an extra crunchy texture with a boost of saltiness which pretzels are known for.  The chocolate and peanut butter chips gave it a traditional sweetness.  The sweetness and saltiness together just tantilizes your taste buds!

I must have made my cookies smaller than the recipe intended because it said it makes 20-24 but I got a good 3 dozen out of them so extras definitely got passed along to friends and family.  That's not to say we didn't keep quite a few, though.  Chris has been eating at least 2 per day since I made the batch.  I told him that just because they're called "Chubby Hubby Cookies" doesn't mean he's supposed to eat them all and actually get chubby!  Phew, good thing we've been exercising!

The rest of my (Belated) Valentine's Day At Home Bravo! Italian Cucina Dinner menu included:

• Insalata Della Casa ($2.59 each with meal)
• Foccacia Bread and Sun Dried Tomato Dipping Oil (free with meal)*
• Pasta Bravo ($13.99 each)
• Dessert ($3.99+ each), Chubby Hubby Cookies (unrelated to Bravo...just wanted to try them!)

*Note: I didn't make the dipping oil this time but I've linked to a recipe that I've bookmarked to try next time that's supposedly the real deal from Bravo! It'll need scaling though as the recipe is for 1 GALLON! Sheesh!

Chubby Hubby Cookies
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Yields: 20-24 cookies (but I got more like 36 so these must be large cookies!)

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup butter, softened to room temperature
• 1 cup graulated sugar
• 1/2 cup firmly-packed light brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 3/4 cup semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate chips*
• 3/4 cup peanut butter chips*
• 1/2 cup crushed and processed pretzel sticks*

* Subsituted 1 1/2 cups chocolate peanut butter swirl chips because that's what I had on hand!  I figured since they're swirly it's the same difference and more evenly distributed in the cookie flavor-wise :).
** The pretzel sticks can actually be any hard pretzel - thin sticks, standard pretzel shapes, pretzel rods, etc. Place them in a food processor and process until you get the consistency of graham cracker crumbs.If you want more texture in the cookies, pulse the pretzels down to coarse crumbs instead.

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.
2. In the bowl of your stand mixer attached with the paddle attachment, beat butter and sugars until fluffy. Beat in egg and vanilla.
3. Sift flour and baking soda together. Beat into batter on low speed. Stir in chocolate chips, peanut butter chips and crushed pretzels.
4. Drop by rounded tablespoons (or use a small scoop) onto prepared cookie sheets. Bake 11-14 minutes until golden on the bottom and just set in the middle. Cool on wire racks.

Source: Joelen's Culinary Adventures