Every Christmas, I bake these chocolate cookies with frosting. Both family and friends adore them. 120 cookies are produced by this recipe.
| Prep Time: | 1 hr |
| Cook Time: | 30 mins |
| Additional Time: | 8 hrs |
| Total Time: | 9 hrs 30 mins |
| Servings: | 120 |
| Yield: | 10 dozen |
Ingredients
- 7 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 cups white sugar
- 1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (such as Hershey’s)
- ¼ cup baking powder
- 1 ½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1 ½ teaspoons ground cloves
- 1 ½ teaspoons ground allspice
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 large orange, zested
- ½ cup vegetable shortening (such as Crisco)
- ½ cup margarine (such as Parkay)
- 5 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, or to taste
- ¼ cup orange juice
- ¼ cup whole milk
- 4 ounces cream cheese, softened
- ½ cup chopped walnuts
- 3 tablespoons whole milk, or more as needed
- 1 teaspoon orange juice, or as needed
- 3 cups confectioners’ sugar, or more as needed
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
- Whisk flour, white sugar, cocoa powder, baking powder, cinnamon, cloves, allspice, and salt together in a large bowl. Stir in orange zest, then mix in vegetable shortening and margarine with your hands until mixture is crumbly.
- Beat eggs and vanilla in a bowl with an electric mixer until foamy. Add egg mixture to flour mixture along with 1/4 cup orange juice and 1/4 cup milk; knead in the bowl until dough is thoroughly combined and stiff and it doesn’t stick to your hands, about 8 minutes. Knead cream cheese thoroughly into dough, followed by walnuts.
- Form dough into balls about 1 1/2 inches in diameter and place onto ungreased baking sheets.
- Bake cookies in the preheated oven in batches until lightly browned, 12 to 14 minutes. Cool cookies on racks.
- Make the frosting: Beat 3 tablespoons milk, 1 teaspoon orange juice, and 1 cup confectioners’ sugar in a bowl until smooth. Gradually beat in remaining confectioners’ sugar until frosting is thick and drizzles slowly from a spoon.
- Dip tops of cookies into frosting and place onto racks with waxed paper underneath to catch the drips. Let cookies dry, 8 hours to overnight.
- For the frosting, I’ve found that exact measurements aren’t that important. As long as the consistency is right, the frosting will be good. Add some milk and orange juice (more milk than orange juice, about a 90-10 ratio) to get the right consistency. If it gets too thin, add some more powdered sugar. You can add food coloring to the frosting and decorate with sprinkles if desired.
- After frosting the cookies, let them dry overnight on a drying rack over waxed paper. The waxed paper makes cleanup much easier because it catches the dripping frosting.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 78 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 13 g |
| Cholesterol | 9 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 1 g |
| Protein | 1 g |
| Saturated Fat | 1 g |
| Sodium | 83 mg |
| Sugars | 7 g |
| Fat | 3 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
I have a recipe similar to this without the orange juice or zest. It was copied on note cards so many times that the recipe got kind of out of balance. I’m so glad I found this one. It’s perfect. We used to call them meatball cookies as kids.
What wonderful cookies these were! The combo of orange and chocolate you can never go wrong with. I don’t keep margarine, so I substituted butter and it worked out just fine. Do follow the tip for the wax paper as they can get a little messy. Very very good!
Just like my Grandma used to make! Same recipe! My favorite cookies in the world! The tip is correct for the frosting. If you want it heavier use more confectioners sugar. I could have used more but didn’t see the tip until after. The way I made it was to the T as instructions indicated and it is still very good!! Thank you so much for sharing this wonderful recipe with everyone
The last time I had these was about 53 years ago on Christmas Eve and I never forgot the taste. This recipe brought back many great memories and was Exactly the taste I remembered.
I had several people exclaim that it was a tasty ginger cookie. I agree the simple frosting is the best complement to it. With the mix of spices and chocolate, I thought it was like indulging in a cup of Mexican chocolate.
This recipe is delicious. It is more of a ginger cookie than a chocolate cookie. I will tinker with the ingredient the next time I make them.
these were by far the best cookies ever. the frosting was very rich an indulgent!!!!!!!