Moon Pie Food

HOMEMADE MOON PIES

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 350°F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Stir together flours, brown sugar, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon in a large bowl until well combined. Cut in cold butter with a pastry cutter or your fingers until butter pieces are pea-sized and fully coated in flour. Fold in honey, water, and vanilla until dough just comes together.
• Transfer dough to a lightly floured surface. Pat dough together until a cohesive ball is formed, and no dry bits of flour remain. Roll half of dough 1/4-inch thick. Using a 21/2-inch round cutter, cut 8 rounds of dough, rerolling scraps as necessary. Place dough rounds on 1 prepared baking sheet; repeat with remaining half of dough and baking sheet. Bake in preheated oven 10-12 minutes or until tops are just set, rotating pans halfway through baking. Let cool on pans 3 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely, about 30 minutes.
• Once cookies are cooled, spread about 11/2-2 tablespoons marshmallow creme on the flat sides of 8 of the cookies. Place remaining 8 cookies on top of marshmallow creme, creating 8 sandwiches. Place sandwich cookies on a baking sheet and freeze 30 minutes or until marshmallow creme is set.
• Meanwhile, place chocolate and canola oil in a medium microwave-safe bowl. Microwave on 50% power until melted, stirring at 30 second intervals, about 11/2 minutes. Once sandwich cookies are chilled, dip 1 sandwich cookie at a time in melted chocolate. Transfer dipped moonpie to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Repeat with remaining moonies. Let chocolate fully set before serving, about 30 minutes.

SOUTHERN MOON PIES

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Lightly grease a cookie sheet.
• To Make Cookie Crusts: In a large mixing bowl, cream together 1/2 cup butter or margarine and white sugar. Add egg, evaporated milk, and vanilla. Mix well. In a separate bowl, mix together flour, salt, cocoa powder, baking soda, and baking powder. Add flour mixture slowly to sugar mixture while stirring. Mix just until all ingredients are combined.
• Drop the dough onto greased cookie sheet by rounded tablespoonfuls. Leave at least 3 inches in between each one; dough will spread as it bakes.
• Bake in preheated oven for 6 to 8 minutes, until firm when pressed with finger. Allow to cool at least one hour before filling.
• To Make Marshmallow Filling: In a medium mixing bowl, blend together 1/2 cup butter or margarine, confectioners' sugar, flavored extract, and marshmallow creme. Mix until smooth. Assemble pies by spreading 1 to 2 tablespoonfuls of filling on flat side of a cookie crust, then covering filling with flat side of another cookie crust.

MOON PIE

Steps:

• For the moon pie cookies: Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Grease 2 large baking sheets.
• Melt the butter with the marjoram in a large saucepan on low heat. Remove from the heat and stir in the sugar and salt. Add the egg whites one at a time and stir until well blended after each addition. Stir in the flour.
• Drop the batter by rounded teaspoonfuls 2 inches apart onto the prepared baking sheets. Bake, one baking sheet at a time, until the edges of the cookies are browned (the centers should remain pale), 8 to 10 minutes. Immediately remove the cookies to wire racks to cool completely.
• For the marshmallow filling: In a small bowl, soak the gelatin in 2 cups of cool water to soften.
• In a small saucepan fitted with a candy thermometer, mix together the sugar, corn syrup and honey. (Note that you will use this saucepan twice, to make the syrup and melt the gelatin, eliminating the need to wash it between uses.) Place the saucepan over medium-high heat.
• Meanwhile, in the bowl of an electric mixer, pour in the egg whites and beat on low speed until frothy. Add the pinch of salt. When the sugar syrup reaches about 210 degrees F, increase the speed of the mixer to high and beat the whites until they are thick and fluffy.
• When the syrup reaches 245 degrees F, while the mixer is running on high speed, slowly pour the hot syrup into the whites, pouring so that the syrup does not fall on the whisk (or some of the syrup will splatter and stick to the sides of the bowl). Continue mixing.
• Scrape the gelatin and 1/3 cup of the soaking water into the pan that you used for the syrup. There should still be enough residual heat left in the pan from making the syrup to dissolve the gelatin.
• Pour the liquefied gelatin slowly into the whites as they are whipping. Add the vanilla paste and continue to whip until the mixture feels completely cool when you touch the outside of the bowl, about 5 minutes.
• Immediately pipe the marshmallow into the cookies and sandwich.

MOON PIES

Steps:

• For the cookies: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
• Whisk together the graham crumbs, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl. In another large bowl, beat the sugar and butter with an electric mixer until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the vanilla and egg and beat to combine. Add the graham mixture and beat to incorporate. Knead with your hands to bring the dough together into a ball.
• Flatten the dough into a disk, place it on a piece of parchment paper and roll with a rolling pin into an 11-inch circle, about 1/4 inch thick. Use a 3-inch round cookie cutter to cut out 8 cookies. Reroll the scraps to 1/4 inch and cut out 2 more cookies. Transfer the cookies to the prepared baking sheet. Discard the dough scraps.
• Bake the cookies until the undersides are golden brown and the tops are just set, 9 to 10 minutes. Cool completely on a rack.
• Put about 2 tablespoons of marshmallow creme in the center of a cookie (do not spread) and top with a second cookie to make a sandwich. The creme will ooze to fill the sandwich as it sits. Repeat with the remaining cookies, then freeze until the creme is firm, about 20 minutes.
• For the glaze: Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and place a cooling rack on top. Line a second baking sheet with parchment paper and lightly oil the paper.
• Put the chocolate candy coating in a heatsafe bowl (the smallest, deepest bowl it can fit in without surpassing the rim). Microwave in 30-second intervals, stirring after each interval, until melted and smooth, about 2 minutes.
• Submerge a cookie sandwich in the melted chocolate and pull it out using 2 forks, letting the excess drip off. Transfer to the prepared cooling rack and sprinkle with sanding sugar. Transfer to the oiled parchment on the second baking sheet to set. Repeat with the remaining cookie sandwiches.