Triple Mint Chocolate Sourdough Protein Cookies

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Tired of choosing between a fudgy brownie, a chewy cookie, and an indulgent after-dinner mint? With this recipe, you don’t have to! I’ve taken the classic mint chocolate experience and leveled it up: This cookie has a dense, decadent chocolate base, a soft mint-filled center, and a crackly peppermint bark coating. Plus, by adding sourdough discard and a secret protein boost, I’ve created a chewy, complex, and satisfying treat you can feel great about enjoying this holiday season.

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Why You’ll Love This
The Ingredients
Substitutions
Equipment Used
How to Make this
How To Store
FAQ
Other Recipes You Might Enjoy

Why You’ll Love This

TL;DR

Triple Mint Chocolate: A rich combination of mint extract, an after dinner mint center, and a sparkly peppermint bark coating.
Protein Treat: Each cookie contains over 8g of protein, making it a satisfying snack.
Lovely Texture: Made with browned butter, extra egg yolks, and honey for a thick, chewy, fudgy brownie-like texture.
Sourdough Magic: Sourdough discard adds lovely layers of malty, nuanced flavor and keeps the cookie incredibly moist.

The Ultimate Holiday Triple Mint Chocolate Cookies

If you are as obsessed with mint chocolate as I am, you are in luck today!
This cookie isn’t just mint chocolate; it’s a Triple Mint, Triple Chocolate dream!
I layer the flavor with a chocolate-mint dough, a soft after-dinner mint center, and a crunchy white chocolate peppermint bark coating for that all-important holiday sparkle. This creates an incredible, deep, satisfying mint experience.

Feel Good About Eating Cookies With A Protein Boost

Look, I’m not going to lie: This thick and chewy chocolate cookie isn’t diet food!
It doesn’t want to be. I mean, it’s a full-blown indulgent dessert in its own right.
And yet it comes with more than 8g of protein per cookie. How is that for finishing a meal?
Or having it with a nice glass of milk as afternoon snack?
You could even get away calling it post workout snack if you play it right. 😉

Lovely Balance Of Flavors From Sourdough Discard

Ever since I started baking desserts using sourdough discard, I keep being surprised how lovely it balances sweet flavors. Instead of the cloyingly sweet you suddenly get a more nuanced layering of sweet, tangy, slightly malty and just… very moreish notes, which are introduced to them by adding those lively cultures.

Does it make these treats better for you? Sure, if you allow them to slow ferment overnight in the fridge (which is always a good idea to get the maximum flavor development!), but mainly the sourdough just ups the deliciousness of anything you add it to.
Baked goods, that is. Please don’t add it to your coffee! I mean…feel free if you are into that, no judgement here, considering my grandpa used to have a raw egg with his. *shivers*

Hits All The Chocolate Cravings

With all the above mentioned chocolate, it goes without saying that even the most dedicated chocoholic will be satisfied by having one of these Triple chocolate cookies. But do you know that feeling, when you can’t decide which chocolate treat you really want? Is it a brownie type day? Or maybe one for cookies? Or shall I have that after dinner mint?
With these stuffed mint cookies you hit all three at the same time. Featuring a gooey center and a texture somewhere between a fluffy cookie and a fudgy brownie, they’ll have you satisfied for sure.

Oh and I should mention: They even have that incredible nuttiness from the browned butter. Just in case you wondered.

Ingredient Notes

The Chocolate Mint Dough

Butter – Mine is always Irish butter, unsalted. Kerrygold is of course fabulous. But any good quality high fat butter will do. Get the best you can afford, as the flavor comes through nicely.
Chocolate – For all my holiday baking I decided to splurge (and save myself a few trips to the supermarket) and got a big bag of Callebaut semi sweet chocolate chips, plus a bag of white for good measure. I found it comes out at about the same rate as buying the shop brand baking chocolate by the bar, yet has much better quality and comes as chips, perfect for melting. However, good eating chocolate with about 70% cocoa content works perfectly. I love Lindt, but frankly, with the prices for it right now, I found the Callebaut Chips more affordable.
Sugar – More dark brown for chewiness and molasses flavor, plus a little granulated for volume.
Honey – I replaced just one tablespoon of sugar for honey in these cookies, diverting from the original recipe, as protein powder can feel a little drying and honey, with its hygroscopic (moisture attracting and holding) abilities keep the texture of the dough perfectly soft.
Peppermint Extract – Use good quality Nielsen Massey Peppermint extract for the best flavor. Cheap mint extracts can sometimes lead to a toothpaste like flavor. And: A little goes a long way!
Sourdough Discard – Both active (freshly fed) and discard up to 3 days old will work here. Just make sure to weigh it, as it differs wildly in volume. The sourdough has multiple jobs here: Sure, it gives rise, but it also tenderizes and holds onto moisture, countering the drying effects of protein powder. This is why my protein bakes are never dry! And it adds layers of flavor, which is always appreciated.
Baking Soda – The soda balances the sourdoughs acidity and helps the cookies spread a little. No baking powder needed, as they sourdough gives them enough rise for our purpose of creating a cookie more on the fudgy side.
Flour – I use All-Purpose Flour because it has less gluten than bread flour, which helps achieve that tender, chewy texture we want—not a fluffy, bread-like one.
Eggs – One whole egg and 2 egg yolks are in this recipe, since I don’t want the liquid and fluffiness of more whites, but the smoothness and fat content from the yolks. This gives the cookies much of their typical fudgy structure.
Protein Powder – Mostly I use whey concentrate in my baking, same as in these cookies. And while the majority of my recipes are made with MyProtein Vanilla, I switched to Optimum Nutrition Gold Standard Whey in (of course) double rich chocolate for this recipe.

After Dinner Mint Filling

After Dinner Mints – I happened to find a box of Bendick’s Mints, which are, much to my delight – round and fit perfectly inside a cookie.
However, any mint will do, as it’s encased in the dough. Just freeze them before folding them into the dough, so they don’t melt and bubble out before the cookies are baked through.

The Peppermint Bark Coating

While these cookies are lovely as they are, the filling and topping literally take them over the top!

White Chocolate – As mentioned above under chocolate, I got myself 2 large bags, one dark, one white from Callebaut. Their chips melt incredibly well (much better than bars), as they are made for baking. But of course simple white bars of chocolate with a reasonably high cocoa butter content will absolutely do the trick for the coating.
Candy Canes – You might notice that my candy canes are a sparkly pink and green instead of the traditional red and white. This was…half intentional. While I sure love the effect the green has here, I did try to get the red and white ones, but in Ireland, the only red(ish) and white canes I found had strawberry flavor. Yeah, no…

substitutions

Butter – Vegan butter with high fat content will work fine, as you can brown it too usually. If you’d like to use coconut oil, you can too (minus the browning) but use about 90g instead of the full 113g you’d have in a stick of butter, as the browning of the butter will reduce the water content, which isn’t present in the coconut oil in the first place. Your cookies will have a hint of coconut flavor, which you might enjoy.
Chocolate – Most dark chocolate is vegan by nature, but to be sure check the ingredients list. If you are more of a milk chocolate kind of person, that works too, though I would reduce the granulated sugar by about 2 tbsp, as milk chocolate is much sweeter.
Sugar – If you don’t have brown sugar, you could make your own by reducing the amount of it by 1 tbsp, then adding 1 tbsp molasses. This will give you the same deep flavor. Honey works similar (to the molasses), in that it adds the bit of chew and moisture, but without the deep caramel flavor.
Honey – You can replace this by molasses or agave syrup or corn syrup for similar properties.
Peppermint Extract – You could use some peppermint leaves instead and infuse the butter with them after browning. Just crush them lightly, add them to the hot butter while it’s cooling down a little and fish them out with a fork before adding the chocolate. This will result in a more subtle, herby flavor.
Sourdough Discard – If you’d like to bake these chocolate mint cookies without sourdough, that works too. Simply add ¼ cup/30g flour and ¼ cup/60ml milk or plant milk instead. The cookies might come out slightly dryer, as the sourdough also acts as tenderizer and counters the dryness of the protein powder, but they will still be very delicious.
Flour – For the celiacs among you, I heard the King Arthur brand of GF flour works pretty much 1:1 for AP flour. But I can’t get it here to try that out. So if you do, I’d love to hear from you in the comments!
Eggs – Add 1/3 cup (80ml) plant milk with high fat content plus ¼ cup (30g flour) to replace the eggs. Your result might be ever so slightly dryer, but still really good.
Protein Powder – While this recipe is written for using whey concentrate, I found casein works perfectly too in cookies, as they are expected to be a little crumblier. As for vegan protein, Nora from “Nora Cooks” swears on Orgain for her baking. I’m planning to try it once I find it here in Ireland, but until then, if you try it, I’d love to hear about your results in the comments below.
The one I’ve tried in my tests with bread was the Plant Protein superblend from MyProtein, which should work nicely here. Especially if you get the one with coffee or caramel flavor!
Without Protein – If you’d like to make these cookies without protein powder, replace it by adding ½ cup of AP flour, 2 tablespoons of cocoa powder and 1 teaspoon of cornstarch.

The Peppermint Bark Coating And Filling

After Dinner Mints – If you aren’t a fan of chocolate and mint, you can still enjoy these totally mint free! Simply leave out the mint extract in the dough, then swap the filling for your favorite melty piece of candy. I imagine Rolo Caramels or Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups to be exceptional!
White Chocolate Coating – While I love the contrast of the white chocolate to the dark cookie, you can absolutely use any type of chocolate you like. Could I suggest a dark version with caramel pieces to go with the above mentioned Rolo?
Candy Canes – Same goes for the Candy canes: Use some lovely crushed Werther’s caramels to go with a caramel filling. Or even sprinkle with edible glitter to make them look all festive. Maybe just classic colored sprinkled for a child’s birthday? Let your kid pick their favorite candy filling while you are at it. They are sure to be a hit!

Equipment Used

Large Bowl – For mixing. I really like the glass bowl from KitchenAid, as it’s temperature proof, so I can even pour hot browned butter into it without any risk of it breaking. But metal will work marvellously too.
Whisk – To mix butter, melted chocolate and eggs.
Spatula – For folding in the flour
Cookie Scoop – Not essential, but very practical for portioning. I used my biggest one with 2oz/60ml for this recipe.
Sheet pan – To bake your cookies. Having two is great, so you can prepare the second batch while your first is in the oven.

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How to Make this

Preparations

Put your after dinner mints (or any other candy you’d like to use for the filling) into the freezer. This will prevent it from melting before the cookie dough is baked through, which would cause it to leak out.
The rest of your ingredients should be at room temperature. Though the butter doesn’t matter much, as it gets browned anyway.
Line your sheet pans with baking parchment. For any greasy bakes like cookies or buttery biscuits, parchment is better than silicone non-stick pads, as it absorbs any potentially leaking fat instead of puddling around the cookies, creating a greasy feel.
If you want to bake your cookies right after shaping, you can do that.
Alternatively you can allow them to ferment overnight or up to 3 days in the fridge and they will only get better.
For any slight gluten intolerance, 48 hours of slow fermentation in the fridge will remove most of the gluten and make these mint chocolate cookies easier to digest. If you are celiac, please swap the flour and sourdough discard as described in the substitutions.
Get all your ingredients ready and put the dark chocolate chips/chopped chocolate into a heat proof bowl.

Prepare The Chocolate Mint Dough

Browning The Butter and Melting The Chocolate

In a saucepan, melt your butter over medium high heat until it starts to wildly bubble. Stir the whole time, to get even browning. A silicone spatula is best, as it gets all those lovely brown bits from the bottom of the pan.
When the bubble sizes and sounds start to change, lower the heat to medium low and keep stirring until it smells deliciously nutty and has a deep amber brown. Immediately transfer to your heat proof bowl and allow to cool for 1-2 minutes (just so it doesn’t half fry the chocolate but is still hot enough to melt it).

Add the dark chocolate, let it sit for 2 minutes, then stir until it’s all melted and creamy.

Mix in Sugar and Eggs

Once the chocolate is melted, both sugars, vanilla extract, mint extract and the honey can go in. Whisk until well combined and the sugar is dissolved a little.
Because we are dealing with heavy melted chocolate, there won’t be any fluffing of butter and sugar needed, which makes this a very simple and quick recipe.

Now add the egg and egg yolks. In theory one at a time is best, but I can confirm adding all at once (accidentally) works just fine. Mix them in until you have a smooth batter.

Whisk In The Protein and Sourdough Discard

Start with the dry protein powder, as it dissolves best in the liquid ingredients. Mix until no lumps are left.
Then add the sourdough discard and gently stir it in.

Add The Dry Ingredients

Either right in your large mixing bowl or in a smaller separate bowl, add the baking soda and salt to your flour and give it a stir, so the three are well combined.
Now switch to a spatula and gently fold your flour mix into the chocolate-mint mass. Just until no dry flour lumps are left. Don’t overmix or your cookies might come out tough and chewy due to too much gluten developing.

Portion The Chocolate Dough

I would recommend shaping your cookies right away while the chocolate in the dough is still soft. If you put it in the fridge first, it will get very firm and hard to portion.
For the easiest workflow, portion the dough first, using a large cookie scoop. The size of cookie will depend largely on your after dinner mints. Mine were round and about 1in/2 cm wide, so they fit perfectly into the large cookie scoop portions.
Once all are portioned, get your after dinner mints out of the freezer. For round ones no extra step is needed. If you are using After Eight, the arguably most common mints, I’d recommend breaking them into 4 squares, then stack, for the easiest fit.

Fill Your Triple Mint Chocolate Protein Cookies

Now grab a portion of the dough and flatten it in your palm. Due to all the cocoa butter from the chocolate they should be reasonably non-stick. And sure a little mess while baking is to be expected.
Pop the mint into the center, then close the cookie dough over it. Turn the portion over, seam side down on your palm, and, cupping your other hand over it, move in rapid little circles until you have a relatively round cookie shape.
Transfer to the parchment lined sheet pan and tap gently to flatten it just a little bit. Space them about 1in/2 cm apart. 6 per sheet work fine. They spread a little, but not as much as chocolate chip cookies, where the spreading is part of the plan.

Bake Or Store In The Fridge

At this point your can either bake your cookies right away or allow them to ferment in the fridge for up to 3 days. Their flavor will deepen, and the gluten will be lowered in this time, leading to all the benefits from the sourdough.

To bake, preheat your oven to 350°F/175°C.
Bake them at the center of your oven for 10-14 minutes or until the tops start to crack and look set.
It’s fine if they are a bit underbaked in the center, as they will continue to set while cooling.
Allow to cool still on the sheet pan for about 10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Keep the baking parchment. We still need it.
You can either enjoy them as they are, maybe slightly warm, with the filling oozing out, with a nice glass of cold milk (or mint hot chocolate for that matter, just to complete the topic!) or take them over the top of mint-chocoholic dreams in the next step.

The Third Layer Of Mint-Chocolate

Make sure the cookies are completely cooled before coating them, otherwise your precious white chocolate will just run off them.

Grab your still parchment paper lined sheet pans and top them with wire racks if possible. This will allow the surplus white chocolate to drip off them instead of forming puddles.

Crush The Candy Canes

Crush your candy canes. I snapped them into pieces which I put into a strong freezer bag (to prevent any bursting candy cane accidents) then smashed the bunch with my rolling pin on a wooden board.
Mind you, the canes are very hard, so be sure you don’t use your prettiest board, as they may leave marks. Same goes for the rolling pin. Mine is hardwood and didn’t mind, but an old one made from softer wood had dents after a similar smashing. The bottom of a stainless steel pan is a great tool too.
You are aiming for a mix of finer and coarser pieces, so you can mix them up when sprinkling.

Melt The White Chocolate

In a microwave save bowl or in a double boiler, mix the white chocolate chips (or chopped bars) with the coconut oil. Just dollop it in, it’ll be fine.
On the medium setting of your microwave (mine is 600 watt), gently melt the white chocolate in 30 second bursts, stirring between each.
If you never melted white chocolate: It reacts quite different than dark, in that the melting temperature is much lower, and it seizes quicker if it gets too hot. Hence the lower temperature and short bursts. I Found the Callebaut chips are easier to handle when melting than shop bought bars and get a bit thinner, making it better for dipping. But both will work.

Dip And Decorate Your Triple Mint Choc Cookies

Now dip one half of each cookie with the top into the white chocolate (careful, they are still fairly soft. I nearly lost one of mine in it!) then transfer to the wire racks to set.
Sprinkle with the crushed candy canes and allow to set for a few hours.
Admire your handywork, then bit into one, being transported to mint-chocolate heaven!

How To Store

The unbaked cookie dough balls can be kept in the fridge for up to 3 days, allowing the sourdough to slow ferment and improve the flavor.
You could certainly freeze the unbaked cookies for up to 3 months and just bake them 1-2 minutes longer whenever the craving hits.
The baked Triple Mint Chocolate Sourdough Protein Cookies keep in an airtight container on the counter for about 4-5 days. In the fridge they will last up to 2 weeks.
They also freeze very well. Just allow them to defrost on the counter before enjoying them. Due to the chocolate coating I would not recommend re-heating them.

Now I’d love to hear from you in the comments!

Have you tried this? Did you enjoy it?
What other recipes would you like to see?

And if you enjoyed this recipe, please consider rating, sharing, or leaving a comment – your feedback truly helps my blog grow!

FAQ

Can I make these Cookies Gluten Free?

For the celiacs among you, I heard the King Arthur brand of GF flour works pretty much 1:1 for AP flour. But I can’t get it here to try that out. So if you do, I’d love to hear from you in the comments!

If you’d like to bake these chocolate mint cookies without sourdough, that works too. Simply add ¼ cup/30g flour (GF if needed) and ¼ cup/60ml milk or plant milk instead. The cookies might come out slightly dryer, as the sourdough also acts as tenderizer and counters the dryness of the protein powder, but they will still be very delicious.

Do I need to chill the dough?

Chilling is optional, but recommended for maximum flavor development (sourdough benefits) and an even thicker cookie. Since your dough is chocolate-based, it shouldn’t require chilling for shaping.

My cookies spread/are too soft!

While this is unlikely to happen with this version due to the protein powder, it could become an issue if you skip browning the butter (which removes water from it).

Also, if you decide to make them without the protein replace it by adding ½ cup of AP flour, 2 tablespoons of cocoa powder and 1 teaspoon of cornstarch. This will stop any unwanted spread.

Chilling the shaped cookies before baking can also help, in case there is any spreading still happening.

What’s the best way to melt the white chocolate?

White chocolate seizes quickly when overheated, so using a lower setting on the microwave and heating it in short bursts, stirring in between, helps to prevent that.

I found the Callebaut chips are easier to melt than bars. For the perfect bar melting, I had to experiment a bit, depending on the specific bars I got, melting them in even shorter bursts of 10-20 seconds at a time.

Why Do you add Protein Powder to these triple mint cookies?

I go into detail on why I’m baking with sourdough and protein in my blog post on the topic.
But in short: I found I’m not eating enough protein but am not the biggest fan of meat or pulses. So I started finding ways to add protein powder to my bakes. I discovered that sourdough fermentation helps make the protein and other nutrients easier to digest and absorb, making this a tasty two-birds-one-stone solution. (Please don’t throw stones at birds!)

Why does this recipe use sourdough discard?

Sourdough discard does three important jobs here: First, its acidity naturally works with the baking soda to give the cookie a tender, fudgy texture.
Second, the cultures add a lovely, nuanced malt flavor that prevents the cookie from tasting too sweet, balancing the richness of the triple chocolate and the protein powder.
Last but not least sourdough keeps them moist, even with the protein powder, which can act drying in baked goods.

Other recipes you might enjoy

Super pretty Lemony Shortbread cookies. Of course with sourdough and protein.
Don’t miss the sour candy topping!

The Impossible Cookie: Rippled Protein Sourdough Chocolate Chip Cookies.

Brown Butter Pistachio Protein Cookies w/ Pistachio Cream on a cooling rack. One in the front broken open, the creamy filling and a melted chocolate chunk oozing out.

Lucious Brown Butter Pistachio Cookies. Secretly Gluten Free. Though no one will ever suspect it.