PEPPER JELLY CORNMEAL CUPS #65

PEPPER JELLY CORNMEAL CUPS #65 from Better homes and Gardens 100 Best Cookies periodical 2010

THESE ARE MY NEW FAVORITES!!! They sound a little weird, hot pepper jam on a cornmeal cookie but I had to leave the kitchen and blog about them to quit eating them--yummy!!

1 cup butter softened
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 egg yolks
1 teaspoon vanilla (I just realized I forgot to put this in, apparently they don't need it)
2/3 cup yellow cornmeal
2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 cup red and or green jalepeno jelly (it takes more than this, I probably used an entire cup of hot pepper jam)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl beat butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add brown sugar and baking powder. Beat until combined, scraping bowl occasionally. Beat in egg yolks and vanilla until combined. Beat in cornmeal. Beat in flour.

Shape dough into 3/4 inch balls. Place balls 1 inch apart on an ungreased cookie sheet (mine were lined with parchment paper). Using your thumb, make an indentation on the center of each cookie. Fill each center with about 1/8 teaspoon jelly. (I filled each with about 1 teaspoon-the cookies they made must have been much smaller than they show in the picture because I used much more jam and made half the cookies they did).

Bake in a preheated oven about 10 minutes or until bottoms are lightly browned. Cool on cookie sheet for 1 minute. Transfer cookies to a wire rack, cool. Makes about 96 cookies---um, no, mine made 48 awesome, wonderful, tasty cookies!!!!!