Cream Cheese Chocolate Croissant Cookies Recipe

Cream Cheese Chocolate Croissant Cookies — perfect for gift giving!

The holidays are a special time for baking: thoughtful food gifts, neighborhood deliveries, and lively cookie exchanges. I love the variety that shows up at those tables—every year there’s something new and delicious to try.

This season I joined a different kind of cookie swap: The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap. It’s populated by food bloggers, so you know the cookies exchanged across the country will be creative and well made. More importantly, the event supports Cookies for Kids’ Cancer, turning a fun tradition into a way to raise funds for a meaningful cause.

When many people contribute a little, the results are surprising—this swap raised over $13,000 to help kids with cancer. That kind of impact from something as simple as sharing cookies is inspiring and reminds me how small acts can add up.

For the swap I chose Cream Cheese Chocolate Croissant Cookies. They’re sturdy enough to survive shipping yet look delicate and elegant. The cookies have a satisfying chocolate hit while still holding their shape in warmer climates, which is ideal for mailing. Thankfully this recipe yields four dozen, because I had to send most away—three dozen were mailed to swap partners—and still managed to let each child try one during taste testing.

I won’t say exactly how many I sampled before shipping, but let’s just say there were ample opportunities for quality control.

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Yield: 4 dozen cookies

Cream Cheese Chocolate Croissant Cookies

Ingredients

for the dough

1 cup butter, softened
1 block (8 ounces) cream cheese, softened
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 egg white
1 tablespoon water
decorator sugar for dusting

for the filling

2 tablespoons melted butter
6 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 cups mini chocolate chips

Instructions

Cream the butter and cream cheese together until smooth. Add the sugar and vanilla and beat until blended. Mix in the flour and salt.
Divide the dough into six equal portions, wrap each in plastic, and refrigerate for 30 minutes to firm.
On a lightly floured surface, roll each portion to an 8-inch diameter disk. Place disks on wax paper with layers between them and refrigerate another 30 minutes.
Work with one disk at a time: brush with melted butter, sprinkle 1 tablespoon sugar evenly over the surface, then scatter 1/4 cup mini chocolate chips. Cut into 8 wedges. Starting at the wide end, roll each wedge into a croissant shape.
Place the cookies on a parchment-lined or lightly greased baking sheet. Whisk the egg white with water to make an egg wash, brush the tops, and sprinkle with decorator sugar.
Bake in a preheated 350°F oven for 20–22 minutes or until just golden. Let cookies rest on the baking sheet for 10 minutes, then transfer to a rack to cool completely.