Tag Archives: cookies

Double Chocolate Walnut Cookies

5 Apr

I’ve had these cookies in mind for a while.  The problem was, that was the only place the cookies could be found: in my mind.  There was no recipe I could dig up in a book, no bakery I could run to in order to hunt down the cookie.  The existence of the cookie—perhaps originating in a dream, because I simply refuse to believe that I am the only person on earth who dreams of cookies—was nowhere to be found.

Maybe that was a blessing.  Because I had only an imagined notion of what sort of cookie I wanted to eat—and yet I also somehow knew exactly what it was I wanted in the mythical cookie, that being lots of chocolate, a chewy middle, and big bites of walnuts—there was very little holding me back in the way of experimentation.  It was a golden opportunity, really.  I was going to create a cookie and there was nothing stopping me.

Except, of course, the unforeseen development of actually somehow nailing the cookie recipe on the first try.  No joke.  When I set out to make this cookie, I was envisioning days upon days of rejected cookie batches.  I was imagining myself eating cookie after cookie, faced with the fact that one batch was too crisp, or maybe not chocolaty enough.  What to do?  Well, I guess I’ll just have to get back to the drawing board.  Time to make and sample more cookies.

But no.  Here they are, the first batch I auditioned, and they are perfect in every way.  Practically bursting with chunks of bittersweet chocolate, the cookies are crisp at the edges and wonderfully soft in the middle.  Chunks of toasted walnuts invade every bite, and, dare I say it, the sweetness level is spot on.  I don’t know how it happened.  I only had to make one batch of cookies, which meant I only had to taste one batch of cookies.  Setting aside the fact that I somehow just satisfied a hazy cookie dream, I somehow feel as though I have made a mistake.  I promise to do worse next time.  You know.  So there will be more samples.

Last year: Roasted Poblano Johnnycakes

Double Chocolate Walnut Cookies Recipe

1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour

½ cup Dutch process cocoa powder

1 teaspoon espresso powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

1 stick (8 tablespoons) unsalted butter, melted

½ cup gently packed light brown sugar

¼ cup granulated sugar

2 large eggs

2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

8 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped into medium chunks (about ¼-inch chunks at the largest)

1 cup (about 4 ounces) walnut pieces, toasted until browned and aromatic

Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.  Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, cocoa powder, espresso powder, baking soda, and salt.  Whisk together, then set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine the melted butter, light brown sugar, granulated sugar, eggs, and vanilla.  Whisk for 1 or 2 minutes to combine thoroughly.

Gently fold the flour mixture into the sugar mixture until the two are completely combined.  Stir in the chocolate chunks and toasted walnuts.  The batter will be extremely stiff and it should seem like there is a disturbingly high chunk-to-batter ratio.  This is a good thing.

Scoop the batter in heaping tablespoons (if your tablespoons are very heaping, you should end up with about a 2 tablespoon-sized scoop, which is perfect) onto a prepared baking sheet.  Space the scoops at least two inches apart.  I was able to fit 8 cookies on 1 large baking sheet.

Bake the cookies, one sheet at a time, in the center of the oven for 10-13 minutes, until the edges of the cookies are just starting to look dry but the centers still appear soft.  Remove from oven and allow the cookies to rest on the baking sheet for about 2 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool.

Depending on the size of your scoops, you should end up with around 24 cookies, maybe more.

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Peppermint Mocha Crinkle Cookies

15 Dec

A couple of weeks ago, my brother very helpfully (and forcefully) pointed out that there seems to be a tragic lack of cookie recipes on this site.  Among all the cakes and tarts and pies aplenty, thus far I’ve logged a sad total of a mere two cookie recipes.  How is this even possible?  Cookies are divine.  I love cookies.  Everyone loves cookies.  But is it somehow even imaginable that, of all the baked goods available to my baking whims, maybe cookies reside at the bottom of my list of preferred baked goods?

No.  Not true.  As proven by my excitement over the discovery of the magic that is the cookie exchange, I think it’s fair to say that cookies and I, we get along just fine.  Thus, choosing to classify the sore absence of cookies on Savory Salty Sweet as a mere oversight, and certainly not a deliberate snub, it’s high time I remedied the problem.

I love a good chocolate crinkle cookie, which is oftentimes a shame, as it seems as though I’ve eaten a lot of really bad chocolate crinkle cookies.  Cookies with tooth-aching sweetness, no chocolate punch, or a decidedly sandy texture are not fine representations of a chocolate crinkle cookie (or any other cookie, for that matter), but that’s frequently what one gets when trying to indulge in such.  Determined to alter the trajectory of what seems to be the downward spiral of a cookie that used to be—and should be—held in such fine regard, I set to work trying to make a chocolate crinkle cookie that would have all the elements I loved most about the cookie: deep chocolate flavor, perfectly moist texture, and a satisfying sweetness that never fell to the side of cloying.

The good news is, I made some very fine cookies.  The bad news is, I don’t know if anyone who was looking for a traditional chocolate crinkle cookie would eat one of these and declare it the final destination of their search.  Believe me, these cookies are fantastic—rich, moist, and completely satisfying—but they are a long way away from what I started out intending to make.  First of all, when I was deciding how much to punch up the chocolate flavor in this cookie, I very suddenly figured that if I was going to add a bit of espresso powder to the dough to make the chocolate shine, maybe I’d actually just add a whole bunch of espresso powder.  Why?  Why not?  And while I was at it, why not add a bit of peppermint extract to the mix, for no other reason than, hey, here’s a bottle of peppermint extract sitting right next to the bottle of espresso powder, why not throw in some of that as well?

Though I generally would not condone this haphazard method of recipe creation (imagine what might have happened if there was a bottle of zucchini relish or hot mustard next to the espresso powder), in some cases, when you decide to improvise, things turn out in your favor.  And, incidentally, the favor of those around you who happen to enjoy eating cookies as much as you like making them.  Deemed supremely acceptable by the original requester of cookies, these cookies made for some mighty delicious treats, suitable for anyone and everyone you know who adores cookies with a perfectly soft and chewy bite, intense chocolate flavor, and a hint of peppermint.  You know: all humans.

Peppermint Mocha Crinkle Cookies

The peppermint flavor in these cookies is meant to serve as one of many elements going on in terms of flavor.  Because of that, the amount of peppermint extract I list here will produce a cookie with a nice mint tone, but not a brisk slap of mint.  If you want to make a cookie that is more mint-forward, increase the amount of mint extract to a full teaspoon.

Note: This cookie dough will need to be chilled for at least four hours, so plan ahead accordingly.  Be even more ahead of the game by chilling this dough overnight and then baking the cookies at your leisure when you wish to eat them.

2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

1 cup Dutch process cocoa powder

¾ cup white sugar

¼ cup dark brown sugar

½ cup vegetable oil

1 tablespoon espresso powder

4 large eggs

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

¾ teaspoon peppermint extract

¼ cup powdered sugar (for rolling the cookies)

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt, then set aside.  In a large bowl, or in the bowl of a stand mixer, mix together the cocoa powder, sugars, oil, and espresso powder until combined.  One at a time, beat in the eggs, thoroughly mixing in between each one.  Stir in the vanilla and peppermint extracts.  Add the flour mixture to the cocoa mixture, stirring to thoroughly combine.

Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and allow the dough to chill in the refrigerator for at least 4 hours.

When you are ready to bake your cookies, preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Pour the powdered sugar onto a small plate or into a shallow bowl.  Using a tablespoon measure or a cookie scoop, form 1 tablespoon of dough into a ball by rolling it in between your palms.  Dip half of the dough ball into the powdered sugar, then place the ball onto the prepared cookie sheet, powdered sugar-side up.  Place the dough balls at least 1 inch apart on the cookie sheet.  When you have filled a cookie sheet, very lightly and gently press down on each ball, ever-so-slightly flattening the ball just a tad.

Bake the cookies on the center rack of the oven for 8-9 minutes, until the cookies begin to crack on top, and the visible insides of the cookies still appear to be quite wet.  Do not overbake the cookies, as they will become very dry.  Remove cookies from baking sheet to cool on a wire rack.

Makes roughly 6 dozen cookies.

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Chewy Ginger Thins

31 Oct

Every so often, after I have spent the better part of a day trying out recipes and washing pan after pot after bowl several times over in an effort to keep the kitchen from looking as though it suffered through some sort of highly site-specific typhoon, I start to wonder what is wrong with me.  Is it really necessary to test out five different variations of a muffin recipe just to get one that I think smells as good as it tastes (don’t even get me started on that one…it seemed really important at the time)?  Does it really matter if the squash suffers a crack on one side when roasted if it also happens to taste like a heavenly dream?  And do those positively delicious cookies really have to be the size of a quarter, just because when I pictured them in my head they were that small, but, dear lord, it turns out that making them that small will necessitate the forming of, let’s see…200 COOKIES?

That’s right.  I made a cookie recipe that yielded 200 individual cookies.  Why?  Because they were delicious.  Because making them any larger would have made them hard and crisp, and hard and crisp was not what I wanted the cookies to be.  Because eating tiny cookies makes me happy, makes the people around me happy, and, well, because I sort of began to enjoy making tiny little cookies (after the third or fourth batch) in lieu of regular sized ones.  Or, maybe it’s all because of the query I posited in the previous paragraph.  Could there be something wrong with me?

The answer is that, yes, there probably is something wrong with me.  Of course, it mustn’t be forgotten that there is generally something wrong with everybody, and rather than be upset or bewildered by that fact, I think it behooves us all to relish, rather than reject, that fact.  Mild obsession is oftentimes what fuels intense creativity, and, though I would not call my insistence on developing the best bite-sized chewy ginger cookie an incredible feat of genius or inventiveness, it does point to what I believe is an at least mildly admirable trait to possess while in the kitchen: persistence.  And not just any kind of persistence, but cookie persistence.  That’s what I have, and this is what it lead to—the chewiest, most flavorful bite-sized ginger cookie in all the land.

Chewy Ginger Thins

Adapted from Joy of Cooking 

As previously mentioned, these cookies are bite-sized.  Each cookie is formed from about ¼ to ½ teaspoon of dough.  While this may sound completely insane and like a total waste of time to make, hear me out on this.  Forming these cookies is as simple as filling a pastry bag (fitted with a large-ish star tip) with dough and then piping out simple stars of dough on your baking sheet.  It takes between 30 and 45 seconds to form roughly 35 cookies on a baking sheet (yes, I timed it), which is substantially less time than it takes to form a similar number of regular sized cookies.  Forming these cookies is simple and nearly effortless, so making such a large number of them is hardly more noticeable than forming regular-sized cookies.  Don’t have a pastry bag?  No problem.  Just scoop the dough into a large Ziploc bag, cut off the very tip of one of the bottom corners of the bag, and squeeze out your dough using the Ziploc bag as a pastry bag.  Your dough won’t come out in stars, but that’s not a problem since the dough is meant to flatten out when baked.

¾ cup (12 tablespoons) unsalted butter

1 cup dark brown sugar

1 beaten egg

¼ cup molasses (dark or light are both fine)

1 ½ cups sifted unbleached all-purpose flour

¼ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

½ teaspoon ground powdered ginger

pinch nutmeg

1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger

Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.  Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.

In a large bowl, cream together the butter, brown sugar, egg, and molasses.  Combine the flour, salt, baking soda, cinnamon, powdered ginger, and nutmeg, and sift together directly onto the butter mixture.  Stir until smooth.  Add the fresh ginger, then mix to combine.

Using a pastry bag or a Ziploc bag with a bottom corner cut off, pipe or squeeze out cookies onto a parchment-lined baking sheet in approximately ¼ teaspoon portions (if your squeezes turn out marginally larger, don’t worry).  Place each cookie about 1 inch apart, lest they stick together as they spread during baking.

Bake cookies on the center rack of the oven for 7 to 8 minutes, until the edges of the cookies have just begun to appear slightly darkened and dry.  While the cookies are baking, pipe another batch of cookies onto your second prepared baking sheet.

Cool baked cookies on their parchment sheet placed on a wire rack.  When cookies have cooled on a rack for about 5 minutes are and no longer gooey, you can slip the cookies right off of the parchment and reuse the parchment for another batch of cookies.

The desired consistency for these cookies is super chewy but ever-so-slightly firm (they will be very bendy when they come out of the oven, and will become soft-firm when cooled).  If you find your cookies are persistently floppy even after having sufficiently cooled, increase the baking time of subsequent batches by 1 minute.  The size of these cookies is meant to be small, so keep in mind that making the cookies much larger than called for will substantially change their outcome.

Makes roughly 200 cookies that are the size of a quarter.

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