Cinnamon Crunch Cookies

Okay, this wouldn’t be a food blog without the occasional tasty treat, and I definitely have a sweet tooth that requires conquering. If you were to look at my culinary background, you would find that I was primarily a baker but not really a cook. I'm sure I could come up with a million (okay maybe not THAT many) excuses as to why; but the simplest answer would be, I like sweets. Don't get me wrong, I understand all good things in moderation and I'm all for healthy eating/cooking habits. Yet sometimes you don't want healthy. Sometimes, you need something filled with owey goey goodness.

When creating these cookies I had a very specific taste in mind. I wanted to capture something that I loved in my "wheat eating days" but hadn't been able to find in recent years. For you gluten eaters, I'm talking about the cinnamon bread sticks found at such pizza chains as Papa Johns, Pizza Hut, Mr. Gatti’s, Chuck E. Cheese, CiCi's Pizza, etc. To me, these cookies come pretty close to satisfying that craving. What's even better? These cookies aren't packed with the same amount of fat, carbs, and calories that you would find in a typical cinnamon bread stick.

Some of the best features of this recipe: quick, easy, little prep time, minimal baking time, your kids can help, no mixers, no waiting for yeast to rise, no separating of egg yolks, you can eat them without or without icing, and they can be made in advance of dinner parties, outings, or functions. 

Cinnamon Crunch Cookies
w/Icing

Cinnamon Crunch Cookies
(makes 24 cookies) 

3 corn tortilla shells
1 cup sugar
4-5 TBSP cinnamon
1/2 stick butter

Icing Drizzle
1/2 cup powdered sugar
3 tsp vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees

2. Place three tortillas on a plate and microwave for 25 seconds. Remove from the microwave and cut stack of three into 8 triangles.

Preheated and cut corn tortillas
Step 2

3. Place 1/2 stick of butter in a bowl and melt in microwave. In a separate bowl, mix the sugar and cinnamon together.

Butter and Cinnamon
Step 3

4. Spray a non-stick cookie sheet with cooking spray. Create a mini assembly line starting with your tortillas, melted butter bowl, sugar & cinnamon combo bowl, and ending with the cookie sheet.

5. At this step, I suggest designating a butter hand and a cinnamon sugar hand as this part can get a little messy. Using your butter hand (likely your left hand), dip the tortilla triangle in the melted butter making sure to cover both front and back. Drop in the sugar mix. Using your sugar hand (likely right hand), cover the buttered triangle on both sides. Place fully dipped tortilla on cookie sheet. Repeat on 17 remaining tortilla chips.

Cookies coated and ready to pop in the oven
Step 5

6. Bake in oven for 5 minutes. Be careful to NOT over bake. You will notice that some of the mixture ran off the cookies and formed in the cookie sheet. This is normal and will easily break off when removing the cookies from the sheet (which you want). Discard the excess that accumulated in cookie sheet.

Fresh out of the oven. The excess will flake off
the cookies when removed from sheet.
Step 6

7. Remove cookies from sheet and place on serving tray, cooling rake, or plate to cool. Allow cookies to cool for 20- 30 minutes BEFORE serving. If you eat these straight from the oven they will be extremely chewy and we want them crunchy. Optional: Drizzle the top with my quick and easy icing (recipe followed below).

Cookies removed from pan to cool
before applying icing.
Step 7

Icing
1. Mix 1/2 cup powdered sugar and 3 tsp of vanilla extract together in a bowl. Mix until perfectly blended with no chunks of sugar left. If you believe the mixture is still too sweet add TINY amounts of vanilla and mix well. Drizzle over cookies. Enjoy!