Chocolate Butter Cookies three ways

One of my favorite cookies which is a "must-make" on our kitchen gift list each year is Sacher Torte Cookies.  These yummy cookies are made with a chocolate instant pudding mix and no sugar. They are a chocolate thumbprint cookie and, when baked, the thumbprints are filled with either apricot or raspberry jam and drizzled with melted chocolate.
 
Well, this year when I wanted to make Sacher Torte Cookies, I found that I had no chocolate instant pudding mix in my pantry.  I remembered that last Valentine's Day the same thing had happened, and I had used a chocolate butter cookie recipe from Land O'Lakes for the cookie part.  So naturally, rather than make a trip to the grocery store on an already busy day, I turned to that recipe again.  You can find it here: Chocolate Butter Cookies.  I just filled the indentations with a half teaspoon of jam as usual and spooned a half teaspoon melted chocolate over each one to cover the jam.

Then I remembered another cookie that I really wanted to try and thought the same dough would work for it.  It too was a chocolate thumbprint cookie, but the dough balls were dipped in chopped nuts first, then filled with a white chocolate filling (just melt together 4 ounces chopped white chocolate and 2 Tablespoons butter) and topped with a quarter teaspoon of seedless raspberry jam.

(Photo by Taste of Home)

So I doubled the chocolate butter cookie recipe and made 2 kinds out of it.

Later, I saw another cookie I wanted to try, but the Chocolate Butter Cookie recipe was easier.  So I made it again, this time substituting vanilla for almond extract.  We filled the indentations with melted white chocolate and sprinkled them with crushed candy canes.  Very pretty!

We got a lot of mileage out of this recipe in the Christmas kitchen this year.  I highly recommend it!  Undoubtedly there are many more variations one could try.