Cinnamon White Chocolate Cookie Cups

The inspiration for this week’s cookies came from a couple of places. A friend at work is selling her place and she was cleaning out her kitchen. She had several bags of cinnamon chips that she wasn’t going to use, so she brought them to me. I also made a cake this week for my colleagues with January birthdays and I had extra cinnamon buttercream. I didn’t want to waste the frosting, so I planned on how I could use cinnamon chips and cinnamon buttercream.

The cookie recipe I had originally pinned as a Christmas cookie, one that I just ran out of time to make. Instead of making the cookie cups with dried cranberries, I used cinnamon chips. The original cookies were flavored with some citrus zest, but I left that out because I wasn’t sure that would work with this variation. The frosting will make a lot more than you’ll need, so you, too, will be faced with the quandary of what to do with extra cinnamon buttercream. I’m sure you’ll choose well.

This recipe makes just about 2 dozen cookie cups. It’s a fairly small yield, but you get the benefit of being able to bake all the cookies at one time! It’s hard to tell when the cookies are baked through, and when I removed mine from the pan they probably could have baked another minute. Make sure you give the cookies some time to cool, or they will be too fragile and crumble to pieces when you try to remove them from the pan. Once cooled, the cookies are nice and chewy. Paired with the cinnamon buttercream, they have a terrific cinnamon flavor! 

Cinnamon White Chocolate Cookie Cups

6 tablespoons butter, melted

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1 egg

½ teaspoon vanilla

1 cup + 2 tablespoons flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1-1/3 cups cinnamon chips

½ cup white chocolate chips

1/2 cup butter, room temperature

1/4 cup vegetable shortening

1/3 cup packed brown sugar

1 pinch of salt

1/8 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

3 cups powdered sugar

1/4 cup heavy whipping cream

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a 24-cup mini muffin pan with nonstick spray.

In a large mixer bowl, beat the butter, brown sugar, and sugar on medium until fully mixed. Add the egg and vanilla and stir on medium to combine. Add the flour, baking soda, and salt and stir on low until just combined. Add the cinnamon and white chocolate chips and mix with a spatula to incorporate.

Scoop 1 tablespoon of dough into each mini muffin cup.

Bake for 10-12 minutes, until the cookie cups are browned along the edges. Allow the cookies to cool in the pan for 10 minutes before carefully removing from the pan. Cool.

While the cookie cups are cooling, make the frosting. In a large mixer bowl, combine the butter, shortening, brown sugar, salt, vanilla, and cinnamon. Beat on medium until smooth. Add the powdered sugar, one cup at a time, beating until smooth. Once the powdered sugar has been added, with the mixer running on medium, slowly add the whipping cream. Continue beating on medium until light and fluffy. Transfer the frosting to a piping bag and pipe the frosting on top of the cooled cookies.

Cookie recipe inspired by Shugary Sweets

Frosting recipe from Country Cleaver