Red Velvet Thumbprint Cookies with Cream Cheese Filling

So this week at work I was invited to participate in a holiday cookie exchange!  I was so excited because this was my time to show off my "mad baking skills" - haha!  I scoured Pinterest for something different that I knew no one else would be baking.  I found this recipe for Red Velvet Thumbprint cookies, which I thought would be perfect!  I decided to recreate this recipe and put my own spin on it. 

These cookies turned out fabulously!  They are so festive and bright; perfect for the holiday.  I cannot wait to share them with the rest of my coworkers. They also work great as a small gift for neighbors or friends. 

This recipe yields about 2 dozen cookies - which was just perfect for my cookie exchange!

Ingredients:

Red Velvet Cookies
1 1/8 cup of butter (softened)
1/2 cup of light brown sugar
1 egg yolk
1 tsp of vanilla extract
2 cups of all-purpose flour
2 tsp of cocoa powder
a pinch of salt
Red food coloring (I used about 10-15 drops)

Cream Cheese Icing
4 oz of softened cream cheese
1/4 cup of granulated sugar
1/4 cup of powdered sugar
1 egg yolk
1/4 tsp of vanilla extract

Garnish
Melted white chocolate

Directions

Preheat your oven to 300 degrees and line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

Whip you butter, brown sugar, egg yolk and vanilla in a mixing bowl using the paddle attachment of your mixer.  Then, slowly add in your flour followed by the cocoa and salt.  Lastly, add in your desired amount of food coloring.

Roll your dough into balls using about a tablespoon of dough for each one, and set about two inches apart on your cookie sheet.  Press down into the center of each ball with the back of a spoon or your thumb. Bake for about 10 minutes. 

While the cookies are baking, mix all your icing ingredients into a bowl until it becomes a thick, milky texture.  Pull your cookies out of the oven and make a deeper indent in the center of the cookies.  Spoon in your icing, just slightly over flowing your indent in the center of the cookie.  Pop back in the overn and bake again for about 12-14 minutes.  Take out of the oven and let cool.

After the cookies have cooled, melt your white chocolate into a small bowl.  Once it has melted, let it sit for a few minutes so that it is a nice texture for drizzling.  Pour the chocolate into a small plastic bag and cut the tip of a corner just slightly so that you can drizzle a thin line over the cookies.  Lastly, chill the cookies for a couple hours before serving.  Enjoy!