Rich chocolate sandwich cookies filled with a silky chocolate filling — these homemade fudge rounds are far better than storebought!
This is the easy recipe that wasn’t. The cookies that I remade… 7? 8? 9? times. Only for me to decide that the first recipe was actually the best and what was I even thinking trying to improve upon it.
Hundreds (literally) of chocolate cookies have made their way through my kitchen in the past few weeks, only for me to decide that the very first one I tried was perfect (of course, I then had to re-make that 2 more times, just to be sure it really was perfect).
They are everything Fudge Rounds should be — soft, chocolaty cookies sandwiched around a fudgy but smooth and silky filling, and without any overbearing synthetic or processed taste.
I’d actually never tried store-bought Little Debbie Fudge Rounds until a few weeks ago. Zach specifically requested that I make them for him (and he hardly ever makes recipe requests) so I bought a box to do some investigating. I wanted to make sure that these homemade fudge rounds shared key features with the boxed version — distinctly chocolaty super soft cookies with a creamy chocolate filling (and of course, the signature stripes).
These cookies spread very thin while they bake in the oven — that’s a good thing! They’ll be very soft and a little fragile when warm, so take care when handling them out of the oven, make sure you allow the cookies to cool completely on the cookie sheets before you even think about moving them, let alone sandwiching them with the filling.
Enjoy!
Homemade Fudge Rounds
Ingredients
- 10 Tablespoons (142 g) unsalted butter melted
- ⅔ cup (60 g) natural cocoa powder
- 1 ⅔ cup (365 g) sugar
- 2 eggs + 1 egg yolk room temperature
- 1 ½ Tablespoon water
- 1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla extract
- 1 ⅓ cup (170 g) all-purpose four
- 2 teaspoons cornstarch
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
Chocolate Frosting Filling
- ¾ cup (170 g) butter softened (1 ½ sticks)
- 3 cups (375 g) powdered sugar divided
- 4 ½ Tablespoons (25 g) natural cocoa powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 6 Tablespoons (88 ml) heavy cream divided
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Chocolate Stripes
- 1 cup (150 g) milk chocolate melting wafers or you may substitute 1 cup milk chocolate chips and 1 teaspoon shortening
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350F (177C) and line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Set aside.
- Cut butter into Tablespoon-sized pieces and place in a large microwave-safe bowl.10 Tablespoons (142 g) unsalted butter
- Microwave in 15-second increments (stirring between) until butter is completely melted.
- Stir in cocoa powder until completely combined. Make sure the butter/cocoa is no longer warm to the touch before proceeding with the recipe.⅔ cup (60 g) natural cocoa powder
- Add sugar and stir well.1 ⅔ cup (365 g) sugar
- Add eggs, vanilla extract, and water. Stir well.2 eggs + 1 egg yolk, 1 ½ Tablespoon water, 1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla extract
- In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.1 ⅓ cup (170 g) all-purpose four, 2 teaspoons cornstarch, ½ teaspoon baking powder, ½ teaspoon baking soda, ½ teaspoon salt
- Gradually add dry ingredients to wet, stirring until completely combined.
- Scoop cookie dough by 1 ½ Tbsp-sized scoops and drop by rounded spoonful onto prepared cookie sheet, placing cookie dough scoops at least 2" apart.
- Bake on 350F for 10-12 minutes. Allow cookies to cool completely on cookie sheet before filling.
Frosting
- In a stand mixer, beat butter until well-creamed.¾ cup (170 g) butter
- Add 1 cup of sugar and cocoa powder. Sprinkle in salt. Stir until combined.3 cups (375 g) powdered sugar, 4 ½ Tablespoons (25 g) natural cocoa powder, ¼ teaspoon salt
- Add 2 Tablespoons of heavy cream, stir well.6 Tablespoons (88 ml) heavy cream
- Add another cup of sugar and stir, followed by 2 more Tablespoons of cream. Repeat with remaining sugar and cream, and then stir in vanilla extract.½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- Pair off your cooled cookies into sandwich pairs, and then generously spread or pipe frosting/filling onto the bottom of one cookie, sandwiching with the bottom of another, until all cookie pairs are filled.
- Melt chocolate melting wafers according to package instructions (or, if using milk chocolate chips and shortening, microwave chips and shortening at 15-second increments, stirring well in-between), until chocolate is completely melted.1 cup (150 g) milk chocolate melting wafers
- Pour chocolate into small Ziploc bag and snip a small piece out of the corner.
- Pipe melted chocolate over cookies. Allow chocolate to harden before serving (melting wafers chocolate will harden much faster than chocolate chip/shortening chocolate).
Nutrition
Nutritional information is based on third-party calculations and should be considered an estimate only. Actual nutritional content will vary based upon brands used, measuring methods, cooking method, portion sizes, and more.
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Camille J Williamson
cookies were easy to whip up, but the thin batter spread so much and then I used a cutter to cut matching size cookies. so they look nothing like your picture. way to hard to just bake them in exact same size circles.
Sam
I’m so sorry to hear this happened, Camille! Did you let your butter cool enough before adding sugars?
Lisa
Can these be frozen? If so, for how long?
Sam
Hi Lisa! They should be fine to freeze and should keep for a couple of months. 🙂
Katie
is the dough supposed to be somewhat thin (in terms of cookie dough)?
Sam
Hi Katie! It is a little thinner than a typical cookie dough. It needs to spread out a bit. 🙂
Hannah
I don’t have heavy cream. Any ideas of what I could try instead?
I do have a thing a thing of extra creamy cool whip.
Sam
You could use milk! You’ll just need to use less, likely quite a bit less, as it’s not as thick as heavy cream.
Hannah
I made them last night before I saw this – I used the whipped cream! It tasted SO good! Thank you! ☺️
Sam
I’m so glad you enjoyed them, Hannah! 🙂