Sticky, Gooey, Creamy, Chewy

It’s that time of year again. The time when Girl Scouts everywhere literally are everywhere, selling their Thin Mints, Samoas and Tagalongs. I’m talking about Girl Scout cookies, people.

Yes, the little darlings are out en masse, camped out in front of every supermarket in town, hawking their wares. And, they are good at it, too! Seriously. They must throw in a Dale Carnegie course or two when they sign you up! It would take the most hardened of hearts to resist those sweet, angelic faces. I don’t know about you, but my steely resolve goes right out the window each time I look into a pair of those sad and pleading eyes. So, I buy cookies – lots of them. And then, I take them home and try to figure out what the heck to do with them!

This is my niece, Samantha. She’s a Daisy. Sammie takes her Girl Scout cookie selling very seriously. Could you resist that face? I didn’t think so. I bought ten boxes from her. Is there a twelve step program for this? If so, sign me up.

Over the years, I’ve found some fun and creative ways to use my stash of Girl Scout cookies. By far, one of my favorites is in these Tagalong Crescents. These buttery, flaky treats are super easy to put together and they take hardly any time at all. The pastry is nothing more than store bought refrigerated crescent roll dough. The dough is filled with a rich and creamy blend of cream cheese, peanut butter, sugar, chocolate chips and crushed Tagalong cookies. Honestly, from start to finish, these little babies will take you less than a half hour to prepare. As you take that first delectable bite of tender, warm from the oven pastry surrounding smooth and lush chocolate-peanut buttery goodness, you’ll wonder how you ever lived without them.

Once you’ve stockpiled your cookies, the first thing you need to do to whip up these Tagalong Crescents is make the easy peasy filling. Beat some cream cheese, peanut butter and powdered sugar together. I use creamy peanut butter, but crunchy will work fine here too. Don’t use that “natural-style” peanut butter, though. It’s oily and grainy and well… it just looks a little bit gross to me. I don’t know how it would bake up, either. If you do use it and your crescents suck, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

When your cream cheese and peanut butter mix is nice and fluffy, stir in the crushed cookies and some chocolate chips. I use mini chips because I find that they melt a little easier. But, just use what you have handy. I don’t think it really matters a whole lot.

Once your filling is ready, it’s time to unroll the crescent dough. Set the triangles on a baking sheet lined with either parchment paper or a Silpat, and spread a small blob of filling onto each one. Leave a small border around the edges so that you don’t have a big, oozing, melted mess when you bake them. Unless of course, you like big, oozing, melted messes. Then, by all means, spread to the edge!

After that, roll up each of the dough triangles, starting from the wide end.

After all of the triangles are rolled into crescents, brush each with some egg wash and sprinkle with granulated sugar. This will make the crescents all nice and glowy.

Bake the crescents until they puff up and brown.

Let them cool for a few minutes and drizzle some melted chocolate chips on top. You can skip this step, but since you already have an open bags of chips, you might as well use them.

That’s it! Didn’t I tell you that this recipe was easy? And, you probably already have all of the ingredients lurking around in your kitchen, except maybe for the Tagalongs. But, I’m sure it won’t be too hard to find those. If you need a few boxes, I’m sure that Sammie can hook you up.