Not Your Mama’s Chocolate Chip Cookies


Chocolate, Cookies, Gluten Free, Recipes, Vegan / Wednesday, May 2nd, 2018

This may be my favorite recipe. Outside of my Everyday Whole Wheat Bread, it’s the one I use most often. And I have to tell you from the get-go that these are not your ordinary, everyday chocolate chip cookies. I mean, they ARE—I make them all the time, keep them in the freezer, and we make our way through them on a daily basis—but, also, they aren’t.

dried cranberries and chocolate chips
Yeah, baby. One of my favorite combinations right there.

They’re BETTER. These puppies are chock full of three kinds of chocolate—THREE KINDS, people. They are made with a mix of all purpose and whole wheat flour, ground flax meal, and ground walnuts to give them a fabulous flavor, whole grain, and nutritional boost. (You know I am ALL about that nutritional boost.)

If, even for a moment, you’re thinking Ahhh…I don’t think any of my people will like whole wheat cookies, I’m just gonna have to stop you right there because even though these little gems have the good stuff in them and are laden with nutritional value, no one would ever accuse you of trying to trick them into eating some health-food mockery of a cookie. There is nothing healthy tasting about these—they are sweet, buttery, chocolatey cookie nirvana. Which, really, is the best trick of all.

super fluffy butter sugar and eggs
Puffed up butter, sugar, eggs, and vanilla. Takes a few minutes of beating for it to grow all nice and fluffy like this.

But, to me, the thing that transforms these into oh-my-god-I-can-die-happy-now cookies are the dried cranberries. That touch of tart amidst the sweet? Complete and utter PERFECTION. Once I started putting cranberries into these cookies, I never looked back. Much to the dismay of my 15yo, who says every time I make them, “Did you put cranberries in them again?” Yes, kid. I always put cranberries in them. EVERY time. You live here, you know that. It’s the best part.

Not that it deters him, mind you. He’d still eat his weight in cookies if I let him.

perfect cookie dough
The dough is the right consistency when it’s moist and sticking to itself, but not to your fingers.
perfect cookie dough
And, I mean, if you have to taste it to make sure the dough is good, now would be a perfectly legit time.

I had thought this recipe was pretty perfect and had been happily baking it for years, and then about 4 years ago I stumbled across a post on Serious Eats called “The Science of the Best Chocolate Chip Cookies.” And while the article goes into all this way-cool chemistry about which ingredients yield specific results (allowing you to tailor your own recipe to your desired outcome), the resulting recipe is waaaaaay too much work in my opinion.

However, the article did inspire me to make one major change: to let the cookie dough rest in the fridge for a day or two before baking.

chocolate and peanut butter chips
When you double the recipe like I do, adding the cranberries and chocolate makes for a VERY full mixing bowl, and a wee bit of a dance to keep everything in when you turn the mixer back on.

Okay, I know what you’re thinking—what insanity is this? who has that kind of will power?—but hear me out. These cookies are GOOD baked straight away, but they are GREAT if you wait a day. If you scoop all the dough into a container and let it sit in the fridge at least overnight, all sorts of science-y things start happening with enzymes and proteins, and you can read all about that over at Serious Eats, but the short of it is this: letting your cookie dough rest improves the flavor of your cookies like you wouldn’t believe. They gain this amazing toffee flavor that is OHMYGODINCREDIBLE.

chocolate chip cookie dough

I tested it out because I was skeptical at first. Does it really make THAT much of a difference? (Spoiler: It does.) So I baked a tray of cookies out of the batter right away, let them cool, then put them in the freezer. A day or two later, I baked the rest of the cookies. I put those in the freezer, too, because I wanted the cookies to be tasted under the same conditions. Tasting a freshly baked one vs. a cookie from the freezer isn’t exactly starting out on equal footing. So the next day, I took out one of each kind of cookie, let them thaw, then tasted them.

The difference was absolute. While the fresh dough had a premonition, a mere whisper, of toffee to it, that hint metamorphosed into a full-bodied, glorious, buttery toffee flavor in the rested dough. We’re talking the difference between the pretty caterpillar and the gorgeous butterfly, the I’m-happy-to-share-this-with-you and the I-will-stab-you-with-a-fork-if-you-touch-mine. Color me SOLD.

chocolate chip cookie dough ready to rest
Ready to go into the fridge for a day or two.

It takes planning (admittedly not one of my strengths), but it is SO totally worth making the dough ahead of time and refrigerating it. This resting of the dough isn’t just for chocolate chip cookies, of course. You can use this tip for any kind of cookie you’re making. You know, if you can stand to wait.

chocolate chip cookie dough ready to go
These are about 1 1/2 inch cubes because I like bigger cookies. One recipe makes about 3 dozen at this size.
chocolate chip cookie dough ready to go
Before.

The other secret to baking these up to perfection is to underbake them. Yep, you read that right. You want them to be slightly gooey on the inside when you pull them out of the oven so they’ll maintain a bit of chewiness once they’re completely cooled. If you bake them thoroughly, they’ll be hard when cooled. Not that they won’t still be delicious, of course. Nothing wrong with crunchy cookies, and if that’s your jam, go for it. But I prefer my cookies to be a little soft and chewy.

perfectly underbaked chocolate chip cookies
After.
perfectly underbaked chocolate chip cookies
Little gooey in the middle there, see that? THAT will ensure you have crispy-chewy cookies.

These cookies, these buttery, crispy-chewy cookies are a little bit of heaven with the toffee flavor amidst all that chocolate and the sweet-tart of the cranberries. They are everything that’s right with this world, you guys. Seriously.

chocolate chip cookies
Total gratuitous cookie-porn shot. You kinda knew this was gonna happen, didn’t you?
chocolate chip cookies
It’s not that I needed to post two of these photos…it’s just that I have a mean streak. #sorrynotsorry

Even better, they can easily be made gluten free by using a one-to-one gluten free baking flour. AND they can be made vegan, too, by swapping out the butter and eggs for their vegan counterparts.

Can it get any better than this? I’m thinking probably no. And, hey, if this looks good, you should totally check out Bec’s Buttermilk Chocolate Chip Crumb Cupcakes, her Gargantuan Cinnamon Roll (it’s the size of a CAKE, people!), and these dangerous Decadently Delicious Beer Brownies.

 

 

chocolate chip cookie perfection

Not Your Mama's Chocolate Chip Cookies

A rich, buttery, crispy-chewy chocolate chip cookie full of goodness.
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 8 minutes
Total Time: 23 minutes
Course: Dessert, Snack
Cuisine: American
Servings: 3 dozen cookies

Ingredients

  • 1 cup butter, salted (use butter substitute like Earth Balance for vegan)
  • 1/2 cup raw or granulated sugar
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
  • 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt (use half as much if using table salt)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 egg (use egg substitute for vegan, see notes below)
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 1/4 cup all purpose flour (for gluten free see notes below)
  • 1 cup whole wheat flour (or all purpose)
  • 1/8 cup ground flax meal (optional, but adds good nutrition & flavor)
  • 1/4 cup ground walnuts (optional, but adds good nutrition & flavor)
  • 1/2 cup dried cranberries
  • 1 cup total mixture of milk chocolate, white chocolate, & peanut butter chips
  • 3/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips or chunks

Instructions

  • Cream butter and sugar together. Add salt, vanilla, and egg, and beat on medium-high until light, fluffy, and volume has grown, about 3-4 minutes.
  • Beat in baking soda, flour, flax meal, and walnuts. Batter should be easy to pick up and just barely tacky. Add in cranberries and the various chocolate chips. Mix well. Scoop dough into an airtight container, and let it rest in the fridge overnight (and up to 4 days).
  • When ready to bake, preheat oven to 375 F / 190 C. Mold cold cookie dough into 1.5-inch cubes, and place on ungreased cookie sheet about 2" apart. Bake for 8 to 9 minutes, until golden around the edges and still a little gooey inside. Let cool on cookie sheet for 3-4 minutes, then transfer to a rack to cool completely.
  • Keep cookies in an airtight container or, even better, freeze them in zip topped bags. These cookies are great right out of the freezer or thawed.

Notes

An easy vegan egg substitute is flax or chia eggs: 1 Tablespoon of ground flax meal or chia seeds mixed with 3 T warm water. Let it sit for 5 minutes to gel.
To make these gluten free, simply substitute the all purpose and whole wheat flours for a one-to-one GF baking flour.
 
 

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