Chocolate Chip Cookies: The Revelation

You know how sometimes, you didn't know what it was you were looking for until you found it? These cookies are exactly what I want in a chocolate chip cookie, but never knew: soft, pillowy, chewy goodness. These cookies aren't going to satisfy everyone, as they don't have your conventional chocolate chip cookie texture. These are almost muffin like, very puffy, with no crunch. The secret ingredient? Applesauce!

Ingredients
1 1/2  cups  all-purpose flour
1 1/2  teaspoons  baking powder
3/4  teaspoon  salt
1/2  cup  applesauce
1  cup  packed brown sugar
1/4  cup  butter, softened
1  tablespoon  vanilla extract
1  large egg
1  cup  (or more) semisweet chocolate chips

Yields approx. 2 dozen

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375°.
2. Combine flour, baking powder, and salt in a small bowl; stir well with a whisk.
3. Combine applesauce, sugar and butter; beat with a mixer at medium speed until light and fluffy (about 2 minutes)*. Beat in vanilla and egg. Add flour mixture; beat at low speed until well-blended. Fold in chips.

4. Drop by level tablespoons 2 inches apart onto baking sheets coated with cooking spray**. Bake at 375° for 10 minutes or until almost set. Cool on pan 2 to 3 minutes or until firm. Remove cookies from pan; cool on wire racks.

*I didn't feel like breaking out my hand mixer, and just combined everything with a good ol' wooden spoon.
**These cookies are STICKY. They even stuck to my wonderful Silpat mats. Trust me, you need the cooking spray.

By request! A printable version of this recipe.

And now, things to bake!

Here are the sweet treats I've bookmarked recently:

Homemade Peppermint Patties from Serious Eats

Chocolate Wacky Depression Cake from Savory Sweet Life

Peanut Butter Cup Brownie Bites from Savory Sweet Life

 

Chocolate Cake with Orange Chocolate Frosting from Bon Appetit via Epicurious

 

Lemon-Scented Pull-Apart Loaf from the Kitchn

Chocolate Mousse with Olive Oil and Sea Salt from the Kitchn

Mocha Silk Pie from the Pioneer Woman

Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies from Sugar Cooking

S'mores Cupcakes from Bakerella

Peanut Butter Bacon Cookies from Joy The Baker

Candy Cane Cookies

It's that time of year - time for Christmas cookies.

My family doesn't really have any family recipes, but this is one of the few. My mom made these cookies with her family when she was a kid, and then made them with my brothers and me when we were kids. And here's where the cookies become infamous: one year, my youngest brother Jeff got a bit overzealous with the raw cookie dough. Let's just say the now, years later, he still gets a bit green around the gills when he smells almond extract. I still love them, though. They're easy to make, pretty to look at, and mildly sweet. Why we use almond extract and not peppermint I don't know, but trust me, they taste delicious.

Ingredients

1 c. shortening

1 c. sifted confectioner's sugar

1 egg

1 ½  tsp almond extract

1 tsp vanilla

2 ½ cups flour

1 tsp salt

Red food coloring

Directions

1. Mix together your wet ingredients - shortening, egg, vanilla, almond, and sugar. I recommend an extra-large egg, because the dough can be a bit dry. 

2.  Sift in the flour and salt.

If your dough is a little crumbly, you can mix in a smidge of water. You want your dough to have the consistency of playdough. I added water because mine came out like this:

3. Once your dough is mixed, remove half and place in plastic wrap in the fridge (make a giant dough ball). Take your remaining half and add red food dye until you get a nice pink color. Put this in plastic in the fridge as well.

4. Clean up the red food dye you invariably got all over your hands, counter, and the cat.

5. After at least one hour or overnight, break out your dough balls (heh).

6. Roll out some 'worms' the thickness of your pinky.

7. Twist them together, the roll a bit to get them joined.

Then place on a cookie sheet and shape like a candy cane.

7a. Alternate method - the marble. Roll two pieces of dough into a ball, then roll into your worm shape.

8. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

9. Bake at 375 degrees for 9-12 minutes. These cookies don't really puff, so you can place them fairly close to each other on your cookie sheet. They also don't brown too much, and will come out looking pretty much how they looked when you put them in.

Yields about 4 dozen. Last approx. 4 hours until they're hoovered.

Homemade Oreo-esque Cookies

This recipe is billed as "homemade Oreo cookies," but after making them, I'd call that a stretch. They are chocolate sandwich cookies with a cream center, but they don't taste like Oreos. But they're still good and they look good too!

(note: cat/cookie proportions not to scale)


Ingredients:

For the chocolate wafers:
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 to 1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) room-temperature, unsalted butter
1 large egg

For the filling:
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) room-temperature, unsalted butter
1/4 cup vegetable shortening
2 cups sifted confectioners sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Set two racks in the middle of the oven. Preheat to 375°F.
2. In a food processor, or bowl of an electric mixer, thoroughly mix the flour, cocoa, baking soda and powder, salt, and sugar. While pulsing, or on low speed, add the butter, and then the egg. Continue processing or mixing until dough comes together in a mass.
3. Take rounded teaspoons of batter and place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet approximately two inches apart. With moistened hands, slightly flatten the dough. Bake for 9 minutes, rotating once for even baking. Set baking sheets on a rack to cool.
4. To make the cream, place butter and shortening in a mixing bowl, and at low speed, gradually beat in the sugar and vanilla. Turn the mixer on high and beat for 2 to 3 minutes until filling is light and fluffy.
5. To assemble the cookies, in a pastry bag with a 1/2 inch, round tip, pipe teaspoon-size blobs of cream into the center of one cookie. Place another cookie, equal in size to the first, on top of the cream. Lightly press, to work the filling evenly to the outsides of the cookie. Continue this process until all the cookies have been sandwiched with cream. Dunk generously in a large glass of milk.

Recipe: Adapted from Smitten Kitchen via SugarCooking

RESULTS of The Great Chocolate Chip Cookie Experiment

In an earlier post, I mentioned my quest for the perfect chocolate chip cookie. I decided to give Kristen some credit and try the recipe she recommended.

Ingredients

1 c. shortening

1 c. brown sugar

1/2 c. sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp. vanilla

2 1/4 c. flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

1 c. chocolate chips

Directions

1. Combine shortening, sugars and vanilla. 
2. Sift flour, soda and salt. 
3. Add to creamed mixture. Mix well. 
4. Stir in chocolate chips. 
5. Drop by teaspoon on cookie sheet. 
6. Bake at 375 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes.

 

For the first time, I used an actual teaspoon to scoop out 'teaspooned-sized' drops of dough. It really did help with consistency, and contributed to nice, even baking.

As for the cookies? Success! Crunchy but not hard, and salty but not too salty. I'm sure this won't be the last recipe I try (still need to try the bread flour one), but it's my favorite so far!

The Great Chocolate Chip Cookie Experiment

I thought I found the perfect chocolate chip cookie recipe. I used the Joy Of Cooking recipe (Colin gave me the infamous cookbook for Christmas last year), substituting shortening for butter, and got the best cookies I ever made. But, as every good scientist knows, in order to publish your theory, you’ve got to be able to reproduce your results.

And I haven’t been able to. Round 2 came out thick but hard. Round 3 came out flat and chewy. And I swear I used the same recipe!

My cousin Kristen swears by this recipe from Cooks.com:

1 c. shortening
1 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla
2 1/4 c. flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 1/2 c. plain M&M's
1/4 c. chocolate chips

Combine shortening, sugars and vanilla. Sift flour, soda and salt. Add to creamed mixture. Mix well. Stir in M&M’S® and chocolate chips. Drop by teaspoon on cookie sheet. Bake at 375 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes.

I haven’t tried it yet, but this recipe from Sugar Cooking has a key difference: bread flour.


Makes 20 - 30 cookies

Ingredients
2 cups bread flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1/4 cup milk
1.5 cups semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup mini m&m’s (optional)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Grease cookie sheets or line with parchment paper.
   
   
2. Sift together the flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.
   
   
3. In a medium bowl, cream together the melted butter, brown sugar and white sugar until well blended. Beat in the vanilla, egg, egg yolk, and milk until light and creamy. Mix in the sifted ingredients until just blended.
   
   
4. Stir in the chocolate chips and m&m’s by hand using a wooden spoon. Drop cookie dough 1/4 cup at a time onto the prepared cookie sheets. Cookies should be about 3 inches apart.
   
   
5. Bake for 15 to 17 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the edges are lightly toasted. Cool on baking sheets for a few minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.

I have a feeling I’ll be experimenting soon.