The saddest part of a snow day is seeing your lovingly built snowman, fit with a bright orange carrot nose, button eyes wrapped in your favourite scarf and woolly hat, start to melt away and fall into the ground. At the risk of sounding like a John Lewis advert, you can certainly forget the melancholy of seeing Frosty the Snowman melt away by coming back inside to some warm dark chocolate chip cookies.

For my festive twist on the classic chocolate chip cookie, I use white marshmallows to create the melted snowman effect. You’ll see some snowman biscuits covered in fondant however it would be overkill on a cookie like this.

This is my signature chocolate chip cookie recipe which hasn’t failed for me ever since I made this recipe. The addition of cornflour to the cookie mixture helps to keep them soft in the centre and the bicarbonate of soda spreads out the cookies so the edges can get crisp. You don’t even need a fancy mixer, the recipe is easy enough to make by hand.

This is the 2^nd of my 12 Days of Christmas recipes. You can read the first one, my Dairy Milk Caramel Cupcakes, by clicking here.

115g margarine

180g granulated sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla extract

170g plain flour

1 tbsp cornflour, sifted

½ tsp bicarbonate of soda, sifted

100g dark chocolate, chopped into small chunks

White mini marshmallows

Cream together the margarine or butter with the granulated sugar with a rubber spatula, pressing the butter against the side of the bowl into the sugar and beating well. Once it has come together, beat in the large egg and vanilla extract.

Add in the flour, cornflour and bicarbonate of soda all at once and fold together until it forms a soft, pliable but not sticky cookie dough. Fold through the chocolate chunks until they are evenly dispersed through the cookie dough. Cover the bowl with clingfilm and chill the dough for at least 45 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 170°C. Line some baking trays with baking parchment.

Take an ice cream scoop and fill it half full with cookie dough. Drop it into your hand and roll into a ball shape. Place them on the baking tray, leaving room for spreading; a standard square baking tray will hold 9; a rectangular one will only hold 6. Press 3 mini marshmallows into the top of the cookie dough.

Bake the cookies for around 10 – 12 minutes until the cookies are brown around the edges and have spread out and the marshmallows are browned lightly. Place more marshmallows on top of the warm cookies and leave for 1 minute. Then push them down slightly to create the effect of a melted snowman. Don’t push too hard or you will push the warm unset cookie dough onto the paper and it could stick.

Leave the cookies to cool on the tray for a further 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool fully, still on the parchment. Once they are completely cooled, lift them off the parchment and serving with a glass of cold milk or a cup of tea!