Years ago I asked a friend from Maryland if she'd ever heard of her state's famous cookie, the Berger Cookie. She hadn't! This was a surprise, because I was hoping she could give me the lowdown how these famous Maryland cookies came to be. Unfortunately (or fortunately), I had to research it myself.
Over the years I'd heard Berger Cookies described as thick sugar cookies topped with a generous layer of chocolate fudge icing. While they are known throughout Maryland, they are mostly famous in Baltimore where they originated. Created in 1835 by German immigrants George and Henry Berger, Berger Cookies can now be purchased on-line or at various retailers. Given the hot weather and the fact the cookies have a cakey bottom and thick layer of chocolate on top, I figured I’d try a clone version before putting in my order.
King Arthur's Berger Cookie Recipe
First on the list was King Arthur Flour's Berger Cookie, which is the one everyone else seems to be using. They have two versions of the famous Maryland cookies, and I went with version 2. Update: Seems now there is only one version! They've combined the two versions. The picture below shows the old version. The first picture in the post is the new version.
Thoughts From The First Round
Overall, the cookies are good. The base is a cakey vanilla cookie similar to that of a Black & White, while the topping is a soft, rich and sweet icing. I used extra dark chips rather than semisweet to curb the sweetness a bit, and I was careful to weigh and sift the confectioners' sugar since it’s easy to use too much or too little.
I liked the cookies but want to keep playing with the fudge topping. For now, I recommend King Arthur's version. The cookies are beautiful and delicious.
Berger Cookies Recipe
As for 2023, the King Arthur recipe has been updated. It's a good one! I've put an adapted version below with my changes in the icing. I was out of corn syrup and had to use maple syrup. It worked beautifully.
Recipe
Homemade "Clone" of Berger Cookies
Ingredients
- 5 ⅓ tablespoons unsalted butter, softened (74 grams)
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract, King Arthur's is recommended
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ cup granulated sugar (99 grams)
- 1 large egg, bring to room temperature
- 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour (KA says unbleached) (180 grams) -- Go by weight.
- ⅓ cup whole milk (74 grams)
Chocolate Fudge Icing
- 2 cups dark or semisweet chocolate chips
- 1 ½ cups confectioners' sugar, sifted as per the directions (170 grams)
- 1 ½ tablespoons maple syrup (30 grams)
- ¾ cup heavy cream, best quality
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
- Beat softened butter, salt, vanilla and baking powder in a bowl, then beat in the sugar and egg. The way I've been doing it is beating just until fully blended rather than beating in a lot of air. I don't want the base cookie to be too light and cakey, so less beating.
- Add the flour and the milk alternately, stirring with a silicone scraper or wooden spoon, until you have a thick but scoopable batter. It should be pretty sticky.
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
- Using a tablespoon or a scoop around that size, scoop 20 rounds of dough.
- Transfer 10 of the dough balls to a parchment lined baking sheet, spacing 2 ½ inches part. Dampen your fingers or the back of a utensil of some sort with water and press the tops down slightly. Try to make the unbaked dough rounds neat.
- Bake at 400 for 10 to 11 minutes or until the edges are lightly browned. Make the icing as the cookies cool. You can ice them while they are slightly warm or you can wait until they are cool.
- For the icing, before you do anything else, sift about 1 ½ cups of confectioners' sugar and weigh out 170 grams. Mix with the salt.
- Put the chocolate chips, heavy cream and maple syrup in a microwave-safe mixing bowl and heat on high for 30 seconds or 50% power if you have a very high powered microwave. Stir and repeat until very hot, then stir until melted and smooth. Add the vanilla, then gradually add the confectioners sugar, salt mixture, beating until smooth. It will be a fairly loose, but will thicken as it cools.
- Dip the bottom of the cookies in the icing and set icing side up on parchment to set. I like to do this but hold some of the icing back, and spoon on more as it thickens so that it piles better.
- You can eat these right away, but they seem to be a little better after the fudge topping has fully set.
Rick J says
Hi Anna, hope you finally ordered your own original fabulous Berger Cookies. Currently production and web sales of Berger Cookies has been disrupted. There are conflicting causes (ranging from family illness to the warehouse roof collapsing). The last delivery went out to stores 1/31. Many places have depleted their supply and are anxiously awaiting a new shipment. Otterbein's, another local B-more cookie treasure, has seen an uptick in sales of their cookie facsimile.......but it is not a BERGER.
Agreeing with the previous two commenters and being a native Baltimoron with my first forty years there, the Berger cookie portion is definitely more shortbread-like/denser than the KA version (which is also a fine cookie). Please email me at my posted address if you still have not oredered your own and I (from one cookie lover to another) will gladly send you a few boxes of your own (you can order them through the website but you will pay much more in shipping costs).
My wife makes an orange shortbread cookie with orange icing that is incredibly delicious and, in my opinion, unique. I have tasted others but have found none that have the same taste and consistency/texture. Cheers.
Carl Greene says
I spent my 1st 25 years in Baltimore relishing this cookie, so I have to agree with Mary DeBar, the King Arthur is too cakey, while the real Berger is more like the texture of a madelliene cookie...kinda shortbreadish, just sayin'
Anna says
Hi Mary, thanks for the info!
Mary DeBar says
I lived in the B'more area for over 40 years. I tried the King Arthur version and they are nothing like the real Berger cookie. The real cookie has a drier base [as a previous poster said, really just a vehicle to support the frosting]. The frosting on the real thing is fudgier but still soft.
Janice says
Anna,
Leave it to CM to knock me out of kitchen lethargy!!!
BTW,
Loved the post on Sara Moulton's veggie burgers; I've been eating them all week!!
Sue says
How did they go over at the party you took them to? BTW, I'm getting an odd message asking me to sign in with a password. I've been simply closing the box and ignoring it, but I'm wondering about what it means.
Anna says
Thanks so much for the offer to send some! I'm going to wait until it cools off around here and put it an order. Given our weather, that will be around November. Anyway, we really like these homemade cookies. I wish I knew how close they were to the original, but I tried another variation yesterday and it wasn't nearly as good as King Arthur's.
Ruberta says
Being from Baltimore, I can find these cookies nearly everywhere. One or two cookies satisfy suprisingly well and we are rarely ever able to get close to consuming the standard 15oz package sold everywhere. However, one note: if they are purchased fresh, they freeze well and we often enjoy them one at a time frozen from the freezer with about a 3-5 minute thaw. Yum. The fudge like chocolate topping may indeed be rich and decadent, but when eaten with the cookie dense cookie portion it balances the palate and is so very good. I hope you get an opportunity to try the originals. I would be happy to send you some if you have any problems ordering. Enjoy!
Mary says
If your cookies are "beautiful", I'm sorry but they're NOT an accurate clone of a Berger cookie : ) Bergers are turned upside down and dredged (by hand) through the fudge, and you honestly end up with equal amounts of frosting to cookie, or often more frosting than cookie! Oh, they're also oblong but of course shape doesn't affect taste or texture.
I like chocolate and fudge as much as anyone, but true Bergers have too much frosting for my taste; I hadn't considered trying to make them myself but perhaps I'd prefer a clone version where I could use a bit less frosting!
luv what you do says
These look like my favorite black and white cookies that I can only get in NY. My mouth is watering just thinking about them! I will have to check out the King Arthur website!
Karen says
Jane, I'm LOL at your TSA story. I have never heard of either Berger cookies OR Black and Whites. I love learning about the regional things. From a Midwesterner born and raised and still a Midwesterner. ha.
Jane says
Have you tried to replicate the Baltimore Bomb pie, that is made with the Berger cookie in a chess type pie? So yummy, I flew back to California with 8 boxes of Bergers in my carryon to try to figure out how to make one. It took 45 minutes to explain it to TSA, yes mail order them.
Anna says
Fran, you might want to to order some Levain cookies and do a taste test. I did, and this one comes close. Comparing yours to this one, they seem to be the same cookie except for the type of flour and the fact I used European style butter and a convection oven. I may try my version with the AP/Cake/Cornstarch mix just for fun.
https://www.cookiemadness.net/2012/01/more-levain-cookie-clones/?trashed=1&ids=369761
[email protected] says
Anna, I've been wanting to make the Berger cookie for a while now but can't seem to get around to it. I have a 20-page file containing multiple recipes for them, and now I'll be adding yours! The base does remind me of a black and white cookie. In fact, overall, it reminds me of a black and white--just without the "white"! I'm anxious to try them just to compare to my black and whites (also known as "Half Moons" in my hometown of Boston). One cookie I did finally getting around to making and posting (today) is the knock-off recipe for Levain Baker's chocolate chip walnut cookie. Oprah says it's her favorite. It is an outstanding cookie and one of the best of any kind I've ever eaten. I know you've tried a version, but I can't remember if you used any cake flour or corn starch in it. The version I tried uses a combo of both all-purpose and cake flours to replicate pastry flour which is supposed to be the "secret" ingredient in the Levain cookie. Never had the original--but I can't imagine it tasting any better than the clone. It was simply amazing! I'm craving one right now!!
Adam says
Another day, another recipe I've never heard of :). Though I have to say, the descriptions of the "authentic" version are pretty terrifying to a person who reduces sugar in nearly everything :).
I'm very curious to see where you take this one Anna :).
Dorothy @ Crazy for Crust says
Love these, they sound SO yummy!
Chewthefat says
Here is the NPR piece I heard:
http://www.npr.org/2012/04/23/151210970/can-outsiders-appreciate-the-bawlmer-berger
Interestingly, the story mentions that the difficulty of keeping the cookie from melting is one of the reasons it is so regional.
And a four page Washington Post article...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/baltimore-storied-berger-cookies-come-to-washington/2012/04/17/gIQAVMpbTT_story.html
Anna says
Yes, they are rich. I'm curious to see just how rich the Berger fudge topping is compared to the one devised by King Arthur. Thanks for the tip on freezing them. I made a full batch, but half of the topping. That is, I left 12 "blank" so that I could try a new fudge topping tomorrow.
Kelly @ Cibatarian says
I'm from Baltimore originally and Bergers taste like home (along with Tasty Kakes and Utz Crab Chips). My parents send them every Winter. I've been tempted to make them myself but am afraid that if I do it once and succeed I'll do it ALL THE TIME. And my waistline just can't take that. 🙂
To give you an idea of how they're supposed to be, my spouse doesn't like them because "they're too rich". Super rich fudge topping with somewhat plain, a bit dry cookie on the bottom. *drool*
FTR, they freeze really, really well and can be shipped on ice, after they've been frozen.
Anna says
Sheila, definitely tell me what you think! I might try a different glaze/fudge topping tomorrow.
Cookie Sleuth says
The frosting looks fantastic! I have never had Berger Cookies either. Let us know how they are when you order them.
Sheila In MD says
I live in MD and was introduced to them shortly after I moved here...I don't find them similar to black/whites at all but that might just be me! I describe the cookie part as "simply a vehicle to carry the topping" as they are ALL about the chocolate! LOL!!! If it were cooler Anna, I would send you some! Remind me in better weather and will happily do so! I might need to try the clones and see how they compare-thanks for posting!
Chewthefat says
I heard about them on NPR and DID think they sounded like a black-and-white with a different 'topping' distribution. They apparently have quite a following, but they don't make it up to NJ.
Katrina says
They look great!