The perfect chocolate chip cookie

There's something comforting about warm chocolate chip cookies, especially going into the holiday season. And while I don't have the biggest sweet tooth in the world, I definitely love the smell of them.

In the last year or so, I've tested 13 chocolate chip cookie recipes, but my favourite recipe by far is this one by Martha Stewart (seriously, she's a genius). Crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside, these cookies have (IMO) a perfectly balanced texture.

I found the original recipe waaaaaaay too sweet, so I played around with the amount of sugar used.  Below is the recipe with my notes.  Also, I find this recipe actually yields about 26 or so cookies instead of the 20 or so listed.

Another idea: substitute 1/2 the chocolate chips for semi-sweet chocolate chunks.

Happy baking!

(Reminder: make sure your eggs and butter are room temperature)

Ingredients
- 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 1/4 teaspoons salt
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 2 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
- 1 1/4 cups packed dark-brown sugar (reduced to 0.75 cups)
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar (reduced to 1/3 cup)
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Directions
- Sift together flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda.
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Beat butter and sugars with a mixer on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 4 minutes.
- Beat in eggs 1 at a time.
- Add vanilla.
- Reduce speed to low.
- Add flour mixture; beat until combined.
- Mix in chocolate chips.
- Using a 2 1/4-inch ice cream scoop (about 3 tablespoons), drop dough onto parchment-lined baking sheets, spacing about 2 inches apart.
- Bake until golden around edges but soft in the middle, about 15 minutes.
- Let cool for 5 minutes.
- Transfer cookies to a wire rack, and let cool completely.

Peanut butter raisin cinnamon chip oatmeal cookies...

I love the taste and texture of chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. The ingredients are classic and familiar - and always good for a bad day (though many of you know my indulgence of choice are butter tarts). But sometimes, classic and familiar can become stale - which is why I like to take classic recipes and add a twist. 

I stumbled upon such a thing on a random trip to Bulk Barn. I was looking for chocolate chips, but came across cinnamon chips. My first thought: cinnamon chip cookies. Now, I bake often, but I'm by no means an expert baker. So once again, I went back to my teacher Martha Stewart for a recipe I could tinker with and make my own.


Martha (and I know it's presumptuous to use her first name, but hey, it's my blog, so I give myself permission) has a great recipe for peanut butter chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. I find this recipe to be very forgiving, meaning that if you added and substituted one ingredient for another, the recipe would still work. And it did!

Too close...but still yummy

Pasted here is my modified recipe. The only thing that didn't work is my spacing. I was out of parchment paper so didn't space the cookies out as far as I should have...


Ingredients (*means changes/additions):
- 3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
- 1/3 cup whole wheat flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
- 1 cup packed light-brown sugar (*reduce to 1/4 cup)
- 1 cup granulated sugar (*reduce to 1/4 cup)
- 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
- 1/2 cup natural peanut butter
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 2 cups salted whole peanuts (*substitute raisins)
- 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips (*substitute cinnamon chips)
- *1 cup crushed walnuts

Directions (no changes)

Chocolate chip cookie dough truffles

I need to apologize for my lack of blog entries these days - Christmas is right around the corner, and while I've been cooking often, I haven't had much time to sit down in front of the computer proper.

As I'm writing this, I have chocolate chip cookie dough (sans eggs and with condensed milk to bind everything together) chilling on a cookie sheet in the car (my car doubles as a refrigerator in the winter). Once the dough sets (approximately 2 hours in the fridge, but about 45 minutes or so in sub-zero temperatures), I'll take them out and coat them in chocolate to make truffles.

I stumbled across this recipe by Paula Deen (lovely lady with great recipes that must seriously be tested in moderation as they can get pretty rich) last year, and thought it was genius. The elegant appearance of truffles combined with the familiar and comforting taste of chocolate chip cookies. What's not to love?

Of course, like most recipes, I had to tinker - mostly with the sugar, as I find most recipes too sweet.

My tinkerings:
- 300 ML of condensed milk (slightly less than 14 ounces)
- 1/3 cup of brown sugar instead of 3/4 cup - condensed milk is already chock-full of sweetness - the brown sugar is for flavouring only
- 0.75 cups of mini chocolate chips (more than the 0.5 cups called for)
- 1.5 cups of pecans (up from the 1 cup called for)

The recipe is actually quite ingenious - no eggs, so you don't have to worry about salmonella poisoning - and it still retains all of the amazing flavours of the classic chocolate chip cookie.

I do have to say though, it is quite labour intensive. The dough was easy enough to make, but it was the chocolate dipping part that hurt the most.

Making chocolate is fun, but I'm definitely not an expert. Which means that dipping the cookie dough (which, BTW, were shaped with my awesome cookie dough scoop) into melted chocolate coating, taking it out and placing it onto waxed paper was quite painful for me.

Even with my chocolate dipping toolset, it still hurt. I definitely need more practice.

But the end results?  Not as bad as I thought.  Check it out:

While not perfectly dipped, I did manage to get the job done. Paula's recipe calls for 2 spoons if you don't have the right tools. Let's just say I did this last year and I would never, ever, ever, do this again.

Cinnamon sugar cookies

Earlier this week, I mentioned Big Oven, a collection of recipes contributed by fellow foodies. One recipe in particular caught my eye: Mrs Fields' cinnamon sugar cookies. I followed the ingredients and instructions almost exactly, but tinkered with different cooking temperatures and times.

When I followed the recipe at 300 F and baked them for 18 minutes the cookies turned out very cakey.  According to the recipe photos, it's supposed to be cakey, but I' m not a fan of cakey cookies (haha).

So I started to tinker.  I baked the second batch at 350 F for 12 minutes - the texture was a little harder, but not quite there.  So I reviewed the recipe again.  

The recipe calls for 2 eggs - which is a lot. This most likely contributed to the cake-like texture. I think I'll try baking with 1 egg next time.

Overall, it's a tasty cookie, and one that I would make again.

Aunt Mary Dillion's Praline Cookies

To start: I DO NOT have an Aunt Mary Dillon.  However, I think someone from Martha Stewart's staff (or maybe event Martha Stewart herself) does.  I tried this recipe - it was really easy to make, but based on the amount of brown sugar called for, extremely sweet.

It's a yummy cookie, but for those who don't want a dessert toothache (or a sugar crash), reduce the amount of brown sugar used in the baking from 1.5 cups to 1 cup (since you'll be drizzling the sugared pecans on top of the finished cookies).

The cookies are actually pretty interesting - the time needed to bake these things varies from top rack to bottom rack.  The cookies on the top rack definitely needed an extra 2 minutes to turn golden, but the ones on the bottom only needed about 10 minutes at 345 degrees.

The difference in texture in just two short minutes is astounding.  They're either perfectly crisp to soft and doughy (which isn't bad in itself - it just doesn't work out so well for this type of cookie).

Messing with Martha Stewart

I love changing recipes and making them my own once I'm familiar with them - especially cookie recipes. It's rare that I'll add or take away from a cookie recipe on the first try though - especially if it's by MARTHA STEWART (insert echo here). After all, she's the grand dame of cooking. Who am I to question the greatness of her words?(And to be honest, if I ever met her in an alley, I'd run the other way).

But I did...and I'm lucky. I've been meaning to try her Outrageous Chocolate Cookies recipe for awhile now...it looked relatively easy-to-make, plus there are quite a few people in my life who are, quite frankly, chocolate freaks.

To be honest, I find working with oodles of chocolate quite overwhelming. It gets everywhere, plus I find melting chocolate quite a tedious process (this particular recipe calls for using the microwave to melt the chocolate and butter together...let's just say butter EXPLODES).

But this particular recipe was...interesting. This recipe calls for very little flour, which had me questioning whether or not the cookie would ever solidify, or if I'm just making a very expensive chocolate pudding (luckily I wasn't). I also didn't like using semisweet chocolate chunks twice, so I substituted with bitter sweet chocolate. Plus, I added walnuts, changed cooking times and temperatures (my oven tends to run a little hotter).

All I can say is that it turned out really well. I'd love to say it was because I'm an amazing cookie chef, but to be honest, I think it was just dumb luck.

The full recipe can be found below. I placed asterisks where I made changes. Happy baking.

Ingredients

Makes 2 dozen (I actually made 30)
- 8 ounces semisweet chocolate, roughly chopped
- 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 2/3 cup all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 large eggs
- 3/4 cup packed light-brown sugar (*I only used 1/3 cup)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 package (12 ounces) semisweet chocolate chunks (*substitute with bitter sweet chocolate)
- 700 grams chopped walnuts

Directions

- Preheat oven to 350 degrees
- Heat chopped chocolate and butter in a microwave-safe bowl in 20-second increments, stirring in between, until almost melted; do not overheat.
- In another bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.
- In a mixing bowl, beat eggs, brown sugar, and vanilla on high speed until light and fluffy.
- Reduce speed to low; beat in melted chocolate.
- Mix in flour mixture until just combined.
- Stir in chocolate chunks * and walnuts.
- Drop heaping tablespoons of dough 2 to 3 inches apart onto baking sheets.
- Bake, rotating sheets halfway through, until cookies are shiny and crackly yet soft in centers, 12 to 15 minutes.
- Cool on sheets 10 minutes (*20 minutes)
- With a thin metal spatula, transfer to racks to cool completely.

Chinese New Year goodies (Chinese almond cookies)

It's the night before Chinese New Year, which means a big family dinner with amazing dishes (see below).

There are certainly no shortage of goodies going around. From my mother's "lor bak go" (white radish pudding), to lucky red pocket candy (strawberry and cream), to sugared lotus roots, there are lots of options to fill my belly.

But as I grow bolder and gain more confidence to try new recipes, so does my willingness to contribute to the day. This year, it'll be something simple, such as Chinese Almond Cookies. The following recipe was given to me by an Aunt and then modified. (I added some red food coloring when I added the vanilla, egg and almond extract). Enjoy...and Happy New Year!

Chinese Almond Cookies (Makes about 100 cookies)

Ingredients
- 3/4 cup butter, softened at room temperature
- 3/4 cup shortening
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1 egg (room temperature)
- 2 tsp almond extract
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup ground almonds
- 1-1/4 tsp baking powder
- 1 egg yolk (for the egg wash)

Directions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F in the middle rack of your oven
- Beat butter, shortening and sugar in a large bowl until it's fluffy
- Add egg, almond extract and vanilla, beating lightly (red food colouring - optional)
- In another bowl, use a fork and whisk flour, ground almonds and baking powder
- Add to the butter mixture and with a wooden spoon, stir to create a stiff dough
- Roll the dough into 1 inch balls
- Place on parchment paper to bake (2.5 - 3 inches apart)
- Mix 1 spoon of water with the egg yolk to create and egg wash; brush over the cookies (this is what gives it the pretty yellow shine)
- Bake for 12-15 minutes, until the edges are a light golden colour
- Take cookies off of the tray and place on cookie racks
- Cool completely

If you're not giving these cookies away, store them in an air-tight container (between waxed paper). You can also freeze them.

Enjoy...and Happy New Year to all! <> :)

Chocolate hazelnut cookies

I love the taste of hazelnut and chocolate, but I often find the combination to be too sweet. I came across this recipe on Foodnetwork.com, but have since modified it to have less sugar. One of my favourite cookies to make (and give away over the holidays).

- 1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/2 cup butter, softened
- 1/3 cup chocolate hazelnut spread (originally 1/2 cup)
- 1/3 cup sugar (originally 1/2 cup)
- 1/3 cup brown sugar (originally 1/2 cup)
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 3/4 cup chopped toasted hazelnuts

Directions
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

In a medium bowl combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

In another medium bowl combine the butter, chocolate hazelnut spread, sugar, and brown sugar. Using an electric mixer, cream the ingredients together, about 4 minutes. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until smooth, about 1 minute. Using a wooden spoon or rubber spatula, stir in the flour mixture until just combined. Add the hazelnuts and stir until just combined.

Using a tablespoon measure, spoon out the cookie dough onto a cookie sheet, spacing the mounds about 4 inches apart. Use the tines of a fork to flatten the cookie dough. Bake until lightly golden around the edges, about 8-10 (12 minutes max, because it'll start to burn). Use a metal spatula to transfer the cookies to a wire rack and let cool.