Last year my absolute favorite cookie was Eric Kim’s Grocery Store Cookie. I called it my Marie Kondo cookie, it brought me JOY. The original Lofthouse cookies, a cakey blob, packed in plastic trays covered with copious amounts of fake frosting and sprinkles…elevated to a wondrously delicious cakelike, buttery, tender cookie topped with raspberry buttercream frosting. The only thing the two cookies had in common was the SPRINKLES.
Guess which one is the Grocery Store Cookie?
As soon as NYTcooking posted this year’s Holiday Cookies, I looked for Eric’s cookie. It wasn’t hard to find, his was first on the list. For the kid in all of us, Eric developed a recipe for festive M&M Cookies. (Bonus: Video of Eric making these!) Simple, nostalgic and YUMMY. A hint of crispiness on the edge, surrounding a chewy cookie dotted with M&Ms. The M&M’s are cut into pieces so you get this really nice distribution of the candy coating and chocolate center. With the first bite, I was transported back to my 9-year-old self.
M&Ms aren’t easy to cut and not bounce around! My dough bowl and mezzaluna came in handy!
Cookie Workout
The cookies can be made with one bowl, whisk, and spatula (or wooden spoon) with the caveat that you start with soft butter (not melted) butter. If you have a thermometer, it’s around 65-68 degrees. You will also need some arm power as the recipe calls for beating the mixture for one minute to smooth and fluffy. One minute, whisking a dough by hand is pretty long. Opt for your mixer unless you haven’t done your workout for the day.
Geeking Out
The baked cookies ended up with crevices that weren’t apparent in Eric’s batch. I have a theory, I chilled my dough overnight which meant the dough was pretty cold, the butter had solidified and the dough had additional time to hydrate. The chilled dough is a tad more resistant to spreading and collapsing thus creating fissures. Here’s a great geek article on chilling your dough from Buzz Feed. Next time I’ll bake them off with just a short chilling time to see if they don’t develop cracks. I don’t think it impacted the flavor or texture too much. If you try different M&Ms please leave a comment! I think it would be amazing with peanut M&Ms or almond M&Ms.
I like these, I LOVE the Grocery Store Cookie. I’ll be making both for the holidays.
So, make these cookies, pour yourself an ice-cold glass of milk, grab a cookie and enjoy the holidays. I’m going to watch BIG, the perfect movie to go with these cookies!
Straight back to childhood, M7M Cookies, are chewy and a delight to eat.
Course cookies
Cuisine American
Keyword Almond Cookies, ERic KIm, M&M Cookies, NYTcooking
Prep Time 20 minutesminutes
Cook Time 15 minutesminutes
Ingredients
½cup(115 grams) unsalted buttervery soft
1cup(200 grams) granulated sugar
¼packed cup(57 grams )dark brown sugar
1large eggat room temperature
1tablespoonvanilla extract
1teaspoonkosher saltDiamond Crystal or ¾ teaspoon coarse kosher salt
¼teaspoonbaking soda
1 ½cups(185 grams) all-purpose flour
½cup(96 grams) M&M’s
Instructions
Heat the oven to 350 degrees and line 2 large sheet pans with parchment.
In a large bowl, whisk together the butter, sugars, egg, vanilla and salt by hand until smooth and fluffy, at least 1 minute. Whisk in the baking soda, then switch to a rubber spatula or wooden spoon. Add the flour, then carefully and coarsely chop the M&M's, and add them, too. Gently stir to combine. Place the bowl in the refrigerator while you wait for the oven to finish heating.
Using two spoons or a cookie scoop, plop out 2-tablespoon/50-gram rounds spaced a couple of inches apart on the sheet pans. (You should get about 8 cookies per pan.) Bake until lightly golden at the edges, 10 to 12 minutes. Let cool completely on the sheet pan; they will continue to cook as they sit.
Notes
If you really want to use your ixer. The key is not to overmix. On a Kitchen-aid when making cookies I rarely go above setting 4 (medium) when mixing cookie dough. YOu don't need turbo which would increase the chance of overbeating.YOu might want to fold in the flour and M&Ms to avoid overmixing. If not, set mixer to stir and mix until you don't see any flour and stop. Finish it off with a spatula.
Grocery Store Cookies! Sprinkle a Little Holiday Cheer
My favorite holiday cookie of the season is Eric Kim’s (check out his site, wonderful essays, beautiful writing) Lofthouse Style Grocery Store Cookie. It’s surprising since I am not a fan of those ubiquitous cookies with the toothachingly sweet, artificial tasting frosting and eye-popping sprinkles. But his homemade rendition looked so appealing, I had to try them.
Eric’s homage to the grocery store cookies is part of NYTcooking’s week-long video series on Holiday Cookies. He takes the concept of the grocery store cookie and creates a small-batch, no preservatives, all-butter, cream cheese, tender cakey-cookie topped with a sweet, slightly tart raspberry buttercream. The only resemblance to the supermarket cookie is the sprinkles on top!
These cookies are simply DIVINE
The directions are straight forward and if your ingredients are at room temperature, a bowl and a wooden spoon are all you need to make these cookies. How easy is that? But you can be lazy like me and use your stand mixer, especially for the frosting.
Though hand mixing the dough is very doable, if time is short, go ahead and bust out your Kitchen Aid mixer. Combine cake flour and baking powder in a small bowl and set aside. Cream butter, cream cheese, salt, and sugar at medium speed until fluffy. Add the eggs and vanilla extract (yes, 1 tablespoon) and beat mixture on medium for approximately 1 minute to aerate and incorporate sugar. Reduce mixer speed to stir or low setting and add flour mixture. Mix just until flour is incorporated. The dough will be very very soft. Toss the bowl into the fridge for 15 minutes to chill the dough so it is easier to scoop.
Use a two-tablespoon ice cream scoop to measure out the dough. Scoop all of the dough and place it on a pan that will fit in your freezer. Place the pan in the freezer to chill the dough (min 10-15 minutes). Do not skip this step, makes the dough much easier to work with, keeps it from spreading, and gives the flavors time to meld.
Frosting Goodness
While the dough is in the freezer, make the frosting. Freeze-dried fruit is the magic that provides both color and flavor to the frosting- it is this tweak that provides the spark in this cookie. The recipe calls for raspberry but strawberry, blueberry or mango freeze-dried fruit would work. I like raspberry not just for flavor but for color, it gives the frosting a hot pink happy glow. Freeze-dried fruit can be found at Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, and Target. Grind the fruit into a powder in a mini food processor or place in a Ziploc bag and use a rolling pin to pulverize it. Sift to strain the seeds out of powder. The frosting is sweet, tart, and fruity, just delightful.
Combine the softened butter, fruit, vanilla, salt, and sugar in a mixing bowl. Blend on low speed until the ingredients are mixed together then increase the speed to high and beat until light and fluffy, a couple of minutes, and about double in volume. Set aside.
Take the cookies out of the freezer and roll them into balls (eminently doable thanks to freezing). Place each ball on a parchment-lined cookie sheet 2-3 inches apart. If the dough gets too soft or sticky to work with, return it to the freezer. Flatten each to approximately two inches in diameter and one-inch thickness. Bake 13 to 15 minutes or just until the edge starts to color, don’t over bake. You will be rewarded with a tender, buttery, light cakey-cookie with a wonderful vanilla punch.
The Finale: Cookie + Hot Pink Frosting x Sprinkles = Happy
Swirl a generous amount of the frosting on each cookie and then SPRINKLE-FY each one. These cookies are so indescribably good, put them on your BAKE THESE COOKIES list now.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the 2020 Holiday Cookie Box!
Remember Lofthouse Cookies from the Supermarkets? Every little league game, school bake sale featured those sprinkle adorned, frosting laden, cakey cookies in the plastic trays. Imagine a homemade, luscious, delicious, version.
Course cookies
Cuisine American
Keyword Grocery Store Cookie, Lofthouse Cookie, sprinkles, Supermarket
Prep Time 30 minutesminutes
Cook Time 15 minutesminutes
Equipment
Small sheet pan that will fit in your freezer I have a side by side so sadly a regular-sized cookie sheet will not fit
Cookie sheets
2 Tablespoon Ice cream scoop #40 the size of the scoop will be on it somewhere! Sometimes on the handle or the rim of the scoop, even on the little thing-a-ma-jigger that pushes the dough out of the scoop
Ingredients
Cookie
Da Dry Stuff- Combine in small bowl and set aside
2 ¼cupscake flour(285 grams)
2teaspoonsbaking powder
Da Wet Stuff
½cupunsalted butter (115 grams) 1 stick, at room temperature
3ouncescream cheese (85 grams) at room temperature
1cup granulated sugar(200 grams)
½teaspoonkosher salt
2large eggsat room temperature
1tablespoonvanilla extract
Frosting
1cupfreeze-dried raspberries (30 grams) finely ground in a food processor or spice grinder
1cupunsalted butter (225 grams) 2 sticks, at room temperature
2cupsconfectioners’ sugar (245 grams)
1teaspoonvanilla extract
Pinchof kosher salt
Da Bling
Multi-colored SprinklesHappy dust!
Instructions
Make the cookies: In a large bowl, using a spoon, cream the butter, cream cheese, sugar and salt until smooth and fluffy. Add the eggs and vanilla extract, and whisk to incorporate some air and to dissolve the sugar crystals, about 1 minute. Stir in the flour and baking powder until just incorporated.
Heat oven to 350 degrees and line two rimmed sheet pans with parchment paper. Using two spoons or a cookie scooper, plop out 2-tablespoon/50-gram rounds spaced a couple of inches apart. (You should get about 7 to 8 cookies per sheet pan.) Place the sheet pans in the freezer for 15 to 20 minutes until the dough is no longer sticky and easier to handle.
While the dough chills, make the frosting: In a fine-mesh sieve set over a medium bowl, sift the ground raspberries, using a spoon to help pass them through, until most of the ruby-red powder is in the bowl and most of the seeds are left behind in the sieve. (Discard the seeds.)
To the bowl, add the 1 cup butter, confectioners’ sugar, vanilla extract and salt and, with an electric hand mixer, mix on low speed until the butter absorbs the sugar. Then, turn the speed up to high and beat until the frosting doubles in size, about 2 minutes, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula to ensure all the ingredients are incorporated. Transfer the frosting to a small container, cover tightly, and set aside. (You should have about 2 cups of frosting.)
Remove the sheet pans from the freezer. Roll the chilled dough into even balls and flatten them slightly with your fingers so they’re about 2 inches wide and 1 inch high. Bake the cookies for 13 to 15 minutes, rotating the pans and switching racks halfway through, or until they no longer look wet on top, are still light in color and spring back to the touch. They will puff up and crack slightly. Let cool completely on the sheet pan. (They will continue to cook as they sit.)
Using a butter knife or offset spatula, frost each cooled cookie with the raspberry frosting and adorn with the sprinkles.
Thin, Crispy, Gooey, Chocolate Chip Cookies-Get It On, Bang a Pan
I have been a slouch when it comes to holiday cookies this year. LUCKY FOR ME, Jamie is home and baking up a storm…I get the difficult task of eating and posting about whatever deliciousness she has baked up.
I had all this planned of course. My copy of Sarah Kiefer’s 100 Cookies finally arrived which I then strategically left on the kitchen island in full view. Heh, heh, heh. The book is a beauty both in content and style.
She took the bait. Flipping through the book, Jamie landed on the Neopolitan Cookies exclaimed “so making these”. I kept nodding enthusiastically with every cookie she mentioned. We loved the Neapolitans, buttery, chewy, flavored with vanilla, strawberry, and cocoa. These are definitely going in the rotation. The Smores Bars were labor-intensive but worth the effort. Imagine a blondie base, coated with chocolate and topped with a layer of toasty homemade marshmallow fluff.
Despite the many CCC recipes we have, her Chocolate Chip Cookies and the pan banging technique proved irresistible. All we can say is make room for this bad boy in your chocolate chip cookie file, it’s that good. The cookies are thin, crisp-edged yet soft in the center. They’re dotted with chopped dark chocolate bits and finished with a sprinkle of Fleur de Sel. The dough is sweet so don’t skip the Fleur de sel and definitely use dark chocolate for balance.
You should be running to your kitchen now to make these.
Pan-banging
No, not headbanging which is what I have been doing all year, it’s been that kinda year. I first came across pan-banging in Sarabeth’s Bakery cookbook (a beautiful cookbook) Sarabeth’s Kitchen is a New York institution known for their breakfasts, jams, and baked goods. Her version of Chocolate Chip Cookies, Chocolate Clouds, calls for rapping the pan on the oven rack with a couple of minutes left in baking. This causes the cookies to deflate and develop their signature cracks. I adopted this rapping the pan for several of my drop cookie recipes including the Oatmeal Apricot Cookies from Dahlia Bakery. Love the way cracks and crevices look in drop cookies.
Sarah takes it to a whole new level, by repeatedly banging the pan in 2-minute intervals, you get these super cool circular ridges that look like a tree’s age rings. The cookies bake thin and flat, they spread quite a bit, so plan on about 5 cookies per baking sheet.
So take your 2020 aggressions out by making these pan banging chocolate chip cookies and end up with beastly cookies. Win-win.
From 100 Cookies Thin and Crispy, Ridged Chocolate Chip Cookies
Course cookies
Cuisine American
Keyword chocolate chip cookies
Prep Time 20 minutesminutes
Cook Time 10 hourshours14 minutesminutes
Ingredients
2cupsall-purpose flour (284 grams)Gold Medal AP Flour will give you better ridges
½teaspoonbaking soda
¾teaspoonsalt
½pound unsalted butter (227 grams)2 sticks, room temperature
1 ½cupsgranulated sugar (300 grams)
¼cupbrown sugar (55 grams)dark brown preferred
1large egg
2tablespoonswater
1tablespoonvanilla extract
6ouncesbittersweet chocolate (170 grams)about 60 percent cacao solids, chopped into coarse pieces, bits and shards. We used TJ's Pound Plus Dark Chocolate
Fleur de selor Maldon Salt, for sprinkling
Instructions
Adjust an oven rack to the middle position. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper
In a small bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda and salt.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle, beat the butter on medium until creamy about 1 minute. Add the granulated and brown sugars and beat on medium until light and fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the egg, vanilla and 2 tablespoons water, and mix on low to combine. Add the flour mixture, and mix on low until combined. Add the chocolate and mix on low into the batter. (At this point, the dough can be refrigerated for several hours or overnight.)
Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Form the dough into 2.5 ounce (~70 gram) balls (#24 ice cream scoop 1/3 cup each). Place 4-5 balls an equal distance apart on pan.
Place the baking sheet in the oven and bake 7 minutes, until the cookies are puffed slightly in the center. Lift the baking sheet and let it drop down against the oven rack, so the edges of the cookies set and the inside falls back down. (This will feel wrong, but trust me.) Bang it down, if necessary, to make the center fall.
After the cookies puff up again, 2 minutes later, repeat lifting and dropping the pan. Repeat a few more times, every 2 minutes, to create ridges around the edge of the cookie. Bake 13 to 14 minutes total, until the cookies have spread out, and the edges are golden brown, but the centers are much lighter and not fully cooked.
Transfer the baking sheet to a wire rack and sprinkle with Fleur de sel or Maldon salt. Let cool10-15 minutes before removing the cookies from the pan.
Repeat with remaining cookies. Store in an airtight container.
Notes
We used a #24 ice cream scoop, ~2.5 ounces and baked for 14 minutes. The original recipe calls for 3 ounces of dough and bake for 15-16 minutes. You can use King Arthur Flour (higher protein) but it may not develop as many ridges. I would recommend weighing ingredients, esp flour, for accuracy.
Posted on one of my favorite blogs, Ipso Fatto, are a couple of sweets she tried from Food & Wine’s article, The Bake Sale Returns to Its Political Roots.In the current climate, this is right up my alley, political activism through food. A win-win. Her photos and reviews of goodies from the article had me running to my kitchen to get busy and bake.
First up were these fabulous cookies from State Bird Provisionin San Francisco. I guarantee they will be a hit at any bake sale or socially distanced gathering. The cookies have a crispy edge, are slightly chewy in the middle, and are a flavor and texture party in your mouth. The apricots provide tartness to balance out the sweetness of the milk chocolate and toffee. The toffee not only adds to the buttery flavor but a wonderful crunch. So good. It’s been a while since a cookie has really wowed me. It was worth the wait.
One of my favorite farmers market stops is Sunblest Orchards. Their beautiful plums and peaches are now distant summer memories, but in their place are jeweled tone dried fruits and a variety of delicious preserves and sauces. I picked up dried apricots, peaches, and their Apricot Habanero Ketchup, so yummy it has replaced my regular ketchup at home. This past weekend they also had persimmons, fresh and dried-yum. Autumn definitely has an upside. Their apricots were perfect in these cookies.
Initially, I was happy that this recipe only makes half a batch of cookies. But they disappeared so fast I wished I had doubled it!
A couple of swap-a-roos
I didn’t have toffee bits but I did have SKOR bars so I chopped up the bars and used a smidge less milk chocolate in the cookies, NBD. A stash of milk chocolate chips was in the pantry so taking the path of least resistance, I subbed them for chopping chocolate. A good trade-off. The dough can be baked immediately but I like to chill the dough. The flavors have a chance to develop (especially the butter flavor) if the dough rests awhile and the cookies tend not to spread as much. Personal preference. I baked the cookies for about 16 minutes (chilled dough) rotating them in the middle of the baking time. They will brown pretty quickly so start checking at 13 minutes.
I really enjoyed these cookies and intend to make them again soon. Hope you’ll try them too. Next…from the same article, a luscious Almond Plum Cake before plums are done for the season.
Preheat oven to 325°F with oven racks in top third and lower third of oven.
Combine butter, granulated sugar, and brown sugar in bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; beat on medium speed until light and creamy, 3 to 4 minutes. Add egg, salt and vanilla, beat until combined.
Combine flour and baking soda in a small bowl. With mixer running on low speed, gradually add flour mixture beating until just combined, about 30 seconds. Stir in oats, chocolate, toffee, and apricots. You can use the dough immediately or cover with plastic wrap and chill for a couple of hours.
Line a baking sheet with parchment, using a 1 3/4-inch scoop, arrange balls of dough (about 2 tablespoons each) onto baking sheet, spacing about 1 1/2 inches apart. Bake in preheated oven until cookies are lightly browned, 12 to 16 minutes, rotating pan after 8 minutes. To create cracks in cookies, after rotating pan, rap pan on the oven rack. This causes the cookie to deflate and create ridges on the cookie. Optional.
Let cookies cool on baking sheets 5 minutes. Transfer cookies to a wire rack, and let cool completely, about 30 minutes.
Cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature up to 3 days.
Notes
These lacy cookies are studded with tart dried apricot, salty-sweet chunks of toffee, and sweet milk chocolate for the perfect combination of flavors and textures. Be sure to rotate the pans during baking to ensure evenly baked, perfectly crisp-chewy cookies.
The search continues for a thin, crispy chocolate chip cookie just like my grandmother use to make. My first try was a Tate’s Chocolate Chip Cookie facsimile by that guru of American desserts, Stella Parks. While absolutely scrumptious-buttery, caramelized, slightly chewy in the middle with crispy edges, they just weren’t my grandma’s cookies. So…
I took a different tack
I googled, buttery, crispy, thin cookies, leaving out the chocolate chips. Surfing the Pinterest pics that popped up, I came across a photo for Crisp Almond Cookies from Chocolate, Chocolate, and More. It looked promising. The cookies were thin with golden edges and a light, flat, center. They looked a whole lot like my Pau Pau’s cookies but without the chocolate.
So I made the recipe for Crisp Almond Cookies and added mini chocolate chips to the dough. The recipe is straight forward, classic cookie making protocol. Cream the butter and sugar, add eggs, dry ingredients, nuts and finally fold in chocolate. Tips for this particular recipe include soft butter (not melting) and room temperature eggs since you want the cookies to spread. Once again I used a tablespoon ice cream scoop to portion out the dough leaving 2-3 inches between each scoop.
The Grandma Test
These cookies looked a lot more like my grandma’s cookies. These were crisper than Stella’s and buttery, without the caramelization. (My test group actually LOVED the caramel flavors of the Stella Park cookies) I think the inclusion of almonds lightened the cookie and make it less chewy and a touch crisper, again more like Grandma’s. I liked them a lot, definitely getting closer to ground zero for Pau Pau’s cookie. I will try it with walnuts next time since that is the nut she used in her recipe. I don’t think it will change the texture but may add that characteristic walnut flavor. The use of baking powder instead of baking soda also reduces browning. It didn’t make these cookies cakey, which you might expect.
I arbitrarily added 1 cup of mini-chips to the dough. I didn’t want to overwhelm the cookies with chocolate. I ended up with more than 3 chips a cookie but I think Grandma would be okay with a bit more chocolate. I would not put more chocolate. In fact, I might decrease the amount to 3/4 cup in the spirit of her cookies. You could substitute a good quality chocolate sprinkle instead, a suggestion from my kid- the Sprinkle Cookie King. The recipe makes quite a few cookies but luckily you can easily half the recipe.
I took a recipe for Crisp Almond Cookies and added Chocolate Chips! Buttery, crisp with a hit of chocolate, a delicious combination.
Course cookies
Cuisine American
Keyword Crisp Almond Cookies with Chocolate Chips
Prep Time 15 minutesminutes
Cook Time 10 minutesminutes
Ingredients
1 1/2cupsbuttersoftened (337 g) (salted butter)
1cuplight brown sugar200 g
1cupgranulated sugar200 g
2large eggsroom temp
2teaspoonsvanilla extract10 ml
2 1/4cupsall-purpose flour280 g Use a moderate protein flour like Gold Medal
1teaspoonbaking powder4 g
1/8teaspoonsalt0.7 g If using unsalted butter increase salt to 1/2 teaspoon
1cupfinely chopped almonds112 g
1cupmini chocolate chipssub good quality chocolate sprinkles
Instructions
Cream together butter and sugars, until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.
Add in eggs and vanilla and beat again.
Combine flour, baking powder and salt. Add flour mixture to dough, one third at a time until all added. Stir in almonds.
Fold in chocolate chips
Using a small cookie scoop (1 tablespoon), place dough on a parchment-lined baking sheet three inches apart (these cookies spread.) Bake in a preheated 350-degree oven for 8-9 minutes. Until edges turn golden. Let cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before removing to racks to cool completely.
Notes
Recipe is easily halved. If you are looking for a crisp almond cookie, buttery and sweet, just leave out the chips!
The search continues…but we are headed in the right direction.
Thin Crispy Chocolate Chip Cookies, In Search of Grandma’s Cookie
My grandmother, who we called Pau Pau, was the classic iron fist in the velvet glove. She was outspoken and strong-willed, bossy, pragmatic, the protector of her family.
Not gonna lie. She was kind of scary. I see where my mom gets her strength, her willfulness, and her disciplinarian streak. When my brother and I got in trouble, it was mom we answered to, not dad, Mr. Marshmallow.
This isn’t surprising about my grandmother. After all, you have to pretty tough to be a new bride, leave your family, get on a boat (pregnant), and travel thousands of miles to a place where you don’t speak the language and nobody knows your name.
She Was a Bad Ass
My mom next to Pau Pau and Auntie Jessie on Granpa’s lap, four more kids followed.
It was a tough life, six kids, my grandfather working different jobs-farmer, grocery store clerk, restaurant worker, and moonshine maker. Ultimately, they settled in Chinatown and Pau Pau ran a sewing factory, all the kids pitched in and worked the factory. She employed other Chinese women struggling to make ends meet and care for their families. Her six kids grew up to serve in the military, become business owners, a chemist at Stanford, an elementary school teacher, and the first Chinese woman real estate broker in the City.
Ours is the story of the immigrant dream of America
Growing up we spent a lot of time at my grandmother’s house in Chinatown. We usually migrated to the dining room while she cooked up a storm in the kitchen. In one corner of the dining room was a memorial to my grandfather complete with his picture, incense, banners to ward off spirits, and dishes of food. Food is such an integral part of life, like so many Asian parents, feeding us was her way of showing that she cared for and loved us. She cooked mainly Chinese food. Two exceptions, both sweets, were fruitcake (amazingly good, no one used her fruitcake for a doorstop) and Chocolate Chip Cookies.
Pau Pau’s Chocolate Chip Cookies were thin, crispy, and buttery. I could eat a zillion of them, I’m sure I tried. She always kept a tin of cookies on her dining table to tempt everyone that visited.
I remember watching her make cookies. She flattened each ball of dough and carefully placed 3 chocolate chips on each cookie then finished with a sprinkle finely chopped walnuts. When I asked her for the recipe she rummaged through her cabinet, pulled out a package of Nestle’s Semi-Sweet Chocolate Morsels, and tossed it to me. I was incredulous, no way were her cookies the same as the Nestle’s Toll House Cookies. Years later I asked my Aunt if she had Pau Pau’s recipe, nope, but she did recall Grandma would melt chicken fat if she didn’t have enough butter.
So armed with bits and pieces of info, I set out to replicate those darn cookies. I found a recipe on Serious Eats by Stella Parks for “Thin, Crispy CCC, just like Tate’s (never had em). They were buttery, caramelized, sweet, but only the very edges were crispy while the center was a bit chewy. Not the cookies of my childhood. Disappointed I threw the cookies in a Tupperware and left them on the table.
My kids inhaled them. In fact, my nieces, my moms’ coffee group (which met practicing COVID guidelines) loved these cookies. It’s all about expectations. I wanted crisp, buttery, light, and just a couple of chips just like Grandma’s.
But if I didn’t compare these to the cookies of my childhood, they’re really darn good. The best analogy, thanks to my kid is as follows. It’s like you’re going crazy looking for your lost keys…and you find your lost wallet. Yay! But damn it, you still haven’t found your keys.
The recipe calls for a moderate protein flour like Gold Medal AP Flour. Do not use King Arthur or Bob’s Red Mill both of which have a higher protein content. It will throw off the texture and the spread. Stella’s recipes are tested with Gold Medal, readily available, and easy to find, that is unless there is a pandemic. I tried these with White Lily, a low protein Southern flour. The cookies were soft and barely held their shape. My kids liked them (lifetime members of the ooey-gooey cookie club), I thought they were too soft. I used GM for the second batch, the extra protein provided needed structure and crispness, a winner.
Make the dough in a food processor which Stella says is key. Place dry ingredients into the processor and whirl to combine.
Pulse butter into the dry mix until crumbly, add chips, and process 1-2 short pulses. Pour the dough into a bowl and add egg and vanilla, knead until it comes together. Put the soft dough in the fridge to firm it up so it is easier to scoop. With a tablespoon scoop, I measured out over 60 cookies, more than the expected yield. The cookies took 10-11 minutes to bake to a deep rich caramel brown.
The search continues for Grandma’s cookies but I will gladly make another batch of these.
8ouncesassorted chocolate chipspreferably no darker than 70%, see note (about 1 1/3 cups; 225g)
1large eggstraight from the fridge, well beaten (1 3/4 ounces; 50g)
1/2ouncevanilla extractabout 1 tablespoon; 15g
Instructions
Adjust oven rack to middle position and preheat oven to 350°F (180°C). In the bowl of a food processor, combine flour, light brown sugar, raw cane sugar, salt, and baking soda. Process until well-combined; add cold butter and pulse to form a dry and powdery mix; comparable results cannot be produced by hand or with a stand mixer. Add chocolate chips and pulse once or twice to combine.* Chill to make it easier to handle dough.
Transfer the cookie "mix" to a large bowl; add egg and vanilla, stir well; the mixture will seem alarmingly crumbly and dry at this stage. Once the wet ingredients have been absorbed, knead mixture by hand until it comes together like classic soft dough.
Divide into about 56 portions with a 1-tablespoon scoop. If you like, these can be transferred to a zipper-lock bag and refrigerated for up to 1 week or frozen for up to 3 months; soften to about 68°F (20°C) before baking.
Arrange portions on a parchment-lined half-sheet pan (do not use a silicone mat), leaving about 2 or 3 inches between cookies to account for spread. Bake until thin and golden brown, with an even color from edge to center, about 16 minutes (check earlier). I used a tablespoon scoop, yield over 60 cookies that took 10-11 minutes to bake.
Cool cookies directly on the baking sheet until room temperature. Transfer to an airtight container and continue cooling an hour more; the cookies will not be fully crisped until then. At cool room temperature, the cookies will keep at least six weeks in an airtight container.
Notes
*The mixture can be refrigerated up to one week in an airtight container or used immediately in the next step.
I LOVE my Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe. I have been using it for years, folks who try them have asked for the recipe to which I give the standard “if I give it to you I will have to kill you” line, jk. Although I did finally give in and post my favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe, which you can find here. Don’t get me wrong, this doesn’t mean I won’t try other CCC recipes, on the contrary, I can’t resist trying new ones. In fact, one of my favorites is the Tahini Chocolate Chip Cookies from David Lebovitz, the Tahini paste adds both taste and texture, it’s really yummy.
During the COVID crisis, Hilton Hotels has generously released the recipe for their famous DoubleTree Chocolate Chip Cookies. Their signature cookies are doled out at check-in. Everyone clamors over these cookies, who doesn’t like a warm cookie with oozy melted chocolate? Yeah, I don’t see any hands going up. They are delicious-warm, gooey, crispy edges, chock full of nuts and chocolate, perfect with an ice-cold glass of milk, a cup of coffee, or by themselves.
Thank you, Hilton and DoubleTree for sharing
So, of course, I baked a batch. I noticed that the recipe is very similar to my recipe. Coincidence? I think, heck yeah. Interestingly, the recipe includes a bit of lemon juice (to help cookies rise?) and a dash of cinnamon.
I followed the recipe EXACTLY, well, except for the chocolate chips, I didn’t have any Nestle’s so I used Guittard Semi-sweet Chocolate wafers, chopped (could explain why hubby thought they were too chocolatey) and also pecans, a trade-off since I was NOT going to go to the market just for walnuts. Baking in the time of a pandemic.
Light and fluffy (2 minutes)
This is a pretty classic how-to cookie-making directions. The recipe is explicit regarding the length of time to cream the butter and sugar. It makes a BIG difference in the final texture of your cookies. I bake a lot of cookies and I am still nervous about how they will turn out. So many variables-the temperature of the butter, how to cream the butter and sugar, kind of flour, and how much flour is added…I could go on but just thinking about it is making me anxious! Serious Eats has a fantastic primer on Cookie Science, WELL WORTH the read.
The smartest thing I can say is to FOLLOW the directions if you want the cookies to turn out like the original. Cream that butter and sugar for the two minutes the recipe calls for. Start with butter that is not too hard or soft, the scientist in me says take your butter’s temp, it should be around 60-65 degrees. Don’t bring your eggs to room temp before adding them to your batter. Creaming the butter and sugar causes heat and warms the butter. You don’t want it to melt, you worked too hard creating air pockets in the dough that translates to a “light” tender cookie. Adding the cold egg will help keep the temperature from increasing and melting the butter-it’s a good thing.
After adding the dry ingredients
Once you add the dry ingredients, continue to stir until you don’t see any flour. Make sure to scrape down your bowl. Another note, if the author of the recipe calls for a specific brand of flour, take that into account. I use King Arthur Flour, but a lot of recipes are tested using Gold Medal due to its availability (Example-Stella Parks and her Peanut Butter Cookies ). This will affect your cookie due to the protein content of the flour. I’m guessing I could have taken a smidge of flour out of this recipe for a softer, gooier cookie. Don’t overbeat as this will develop the gluten leading to a tough cookie. You wanna be a tough cookie, not make a tough cookie.
Portion out the dough as directed into 3 tablespoons balls. Use an ice cream scoop for this (#24), you will not only get the right size and thickness cookie but nice “purdy” round cookies. The volume of dough definitely influences the cookie spread.
Like crevices in your cookies? About 3-4 minutes before the cookies are finished baking, rap the cookie sheet on the wire oven rack. This will cause the cookie to deflate and give it that craggy, uneven look. Yep, known as the pan-banging method.
Stoked, my new cookie box, courtesy of the hubster and his woodworking talents
I marvel at how bakeries can churn out cookies on a daily basis, not by how they are so delicious but how they are so consistently the same. I’m hoping some of these tips will help. My favorite bakery in Los Gatos (currently closed due to COVID) is Icing on the Cake they make fabulous cookies. I will be the first in line when they reopen, their cookies are so good, so consistent.
1 3/4cupschopped walnutssub pecans or nit of choice
Instructions
Preheat oven to 300°F.
Cream butter, sugar and brown sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer on medium speed for about 2 minutes. Will be light and fluffy.
Add eggs, vanilla and lemon juice, blending with mixer on low speed for 30 seconds, then medium speed for about 2 minutes, or until light and ribbon-like, scraping down bowl.
With mixer on low speed, add flour, oats, baking soda, salt and cinnamon, blending for about 45 seconds. Don’t overmix.
Remove bowl from mixer and stir in chocolate chips and nuts.
Portion dough with a scoop (about 3 tablespoons) onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper about 2 inches apart. (#24 ice cream scoop)
Bake for 20 to 23 minutes, or until edges are golden brown and center is still soft.
Remove from oven and cool on baking sheet for about 1 hour.
Notes
Cook’s note: You can freeze the unbaked cookies, and there’s no need to thaw. Preheat oven to 300°F and place frozen cookies on parchment paper-lined baking sheet about 2 inches apart. Bake until edges are golden brown and center is still soft.
We are a divided family. Hubby likes chewy oatmeal cookies and ooey-gooey chocolate chip cookies. Me? I love shortbread, crumbly, buttery, melt-in-your-mouth cookies with a hint of sweetness, and decidedly not chewy. Perhaps, cookie preference is a dominant gene trait? ALL my kids love chewy cookies just like Wes. I thought it was a kid thing (I consider the hubs a kid). I assumed when they got older their palates would become more refined, sophisticated m. Surely, they would come around.
Nope
Even now, when I make cookies that aren’t chewy the response is “They’re ok” or “I like chewy cookies better” or “Wonder if Dad can make some Good Cookies.” The only rational explanation? Mendelian Genetics. Yep, a predisposition to chewy cookies. Ooh, did you just have an involuntary flashback to high school biology? I concede, in our house, chewy cookies reign supreme.
I Went to a Garden Party
For a summer fundraiser, I volunteered to make Mexican Wedding Cookies. My partner at the dessert table, Emily, brought an unassuming looking oatmeal cookie, They disappeared in a flash which caught my attention. I grabbed one and took a bite. Yum! This cookie was CHEWY, sweet, buttery, with a bit of crunch. It definitely fell into the Wes and kids’ cookie camp. I snuck a couple (ok, more than a couple) onto my cookie plate to take home.
As soon as I got home, Jordan grabbed one of the cookies and gobbled it down, then he grabbed another and exclaimed: “This might be the best cookie yet!”
Determined to make them asap, I Googled cookies, coconut, Rice Krispies, and oatmeal, the ingredients Emily had rattled off to me. Instantly, a bunch of recipes popped up for Ranger Cookies. Some had chocolate or butterscotch chips, and some had different cereals. The blog, Let’s Dish, contained all the ingredients Emily mentioned so this became my starting point. I hit the jackpot, these were just like hers.
Ranger Cookie Tips
Start by creaming butter and sugar until light and fluffy should take about 2-3 minutes tops. Then add eggs and vanilla, mix until well combined. The recipe calls for gradually adding dry ingredients. My detour, add it all at once and combine at low speed just until dry ingredients are fully incorporated. Finally, stir cereal, coconut, and oatmeal in by hand.
Chilling the dough before baking prevents spreading. Use an ice cream scoop to portion out the dough. Bake cookies on parchment paper. With 3-4 minutes left to bake, rap the pan on the wire rack to get the cookies to fall, this helps create those cool crevices.
If your cookies aren’t perfectly round, after taking the cookies out of the oven, quickly invert a glass over each cookie and swirl it around. This will shape cookies into perfect little circles. Or skip it, they’ll be gone before anyone besides you notices.
Feel free to add chocolate chips or butterscotch chips for a twist. You can replace the Rice Krispies with partially crushed Corn Flakes, they’rrrrre great! All you Tony the Tiger fans.
Ok, maybe chewy is not a genetic thing…maybe chewy cookies are just really, really delicious (don’t tell my kids I said that). Either way, they belong on your gotta bake cookie list.
Chewy oatmeal cookies loaded with coconut and crisp rice cereal. Simple and delicious, these cookies are a favorite with kids and grown-up kids as well!
1cupbuttersoftened, this is an old recipe, before unsalted butter was so widely available. I would guess folks normally used salted butter. If using unsalted butter, increase salt in recipe to 1 teaspoon.
1cupwhite sugar
1cuppacked brown sugarlight or dark
The Wet Ingredients
2eggs
1tablespoonvanilla extract
The Dry Ingredients-Combine and set aside
2cupsall-purpose flourI use King Arthur Flour and it worked fine. Once again an old recipe, Gold Medal was probably the standard, which has slightly less protein than KA.
1teaspoonbaking soda
1/2teaspoonbaking powder
1/2teaspoonsalt
The Adds
2cupsquick cooking oatsNO instant oatmeal please
2cupsRice Krispies cereal
1cupflaked sweetened coconutyou could probably use unsweetened coconut too.
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
In a large bowl, cream butter and sugars until light and fluffy. (2-3 min) Beat in eggs and vanilla.
Gradually add flour mixture to creamed mixture and mix well (do not overmix though). Stir in oats, cereal, and coconut.
Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls onto ungreased baking sheets. If you have a #40 ice cream scoop (1.75 Tablespoons) use that to create uniform dough balls.
Bake 8-10 minutes or until golden brown. Let cool on pan for 3-5 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.
Notes
I use parchment paper to line my baking sheets. These cookies can be baked directly on an ungreased cookie sheet.
Another Day, Another Chocolate Chip Cookie (Brown Butter Toffee Chocolate Chip Cookie)
What is your favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe? The one on the back of the Nestle’s Chocolate Chips bag? A treasured family recipe handed down? Mine was given to me by a friend who swore it was the original Mrs. Field’s recipe. I can’t vouch for that claim, but it is pretty darn good. Over the years I have tweaked the recipe by adding oatmeal, reducing the amount of chocolate (don’t hate me), and adding nuts. Yep, the perfect cookie. It is my go-to chocolate chip cookie…until now. A serious challenger, Brown Butter Toffee Chocolate Chip Cookies, has entered the best CCC sweepstakes.
You can have more than one go-to chocolate chip cookie, right? There might be a new player in town.
What makes these cookies so delicious? BROWN BUTTER for a toasty rich, caramel flavor-yum. Chunks of toffee bars for crunch and another layer of caramel flavor-double yum. Finally, Chocolate wafers instead of chips, stay gooey and soft longer creating a luscious texture-triple yum. Upon finding this recipe I immediately headed to the store to look for those chocolate wafers. I found Guittard’s 67% semi-sweet wafers-YAY. A bag costs about eight dollars-BOO. It’s a splurge that’s for sure…but so worth it.
Fold in chocolate and toffee pieces and chill dough for at least 30 minutes in the fridge before baking. Scoop dough balls with a #24 scoop (1.5 ounces) or #30 (1.125 ounces) for a touch smaller cookie. They spread so place cookie dough 3″ apart, especially if you don’t chill the dough.
These cookies will brown quickly so watch them like a HAWK. Start checking them at the 8-minute mark. To create the crevices in the cookies, rap the baking sheet on the oven rack (at the 6-7 minute mark), and repeat 1-2 minutes later. This will cause the cookie to deflate creating those lovely nooks and crannies.
Keyword brown butter, chocolate chip cookie, toffee
Prep Time 30 minutesminutes
Cook Time 15 minutesminutes
Total Time 45 minutesminutes
Servings 20
Ingredients
Dry Stuff
2cupsall-purpose flourpreferably KIng Arthur
1teaspoonbaking soda
¾teaspoonkosher salt
Wet Stuff
1cupunsalted butter2 sticks
1cuppacked dark brown sugar
⅓cupgranulated sugar
2large eggsroom temperature
2teaspoonsvanilla extract
The Add-Ins
2chocolate toffee bars (1.4 oz bars)Skor, Heath or Trader Joe Toffee Bars, chopped into ¼-inch pieces
1½cupschocolate wafersdisks, pistoles, fèves; preferably 72% cacao, although I used 67% Guittard -yum
Flaky sea salt
Instructions
Whisk flour, baking soda, and kosher salt in a medium bowl. Set aside
Cook butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat, stirring often, until it foams, then browns, 5–8 minutes. Scrape into a large bowl and let cool slightly.
Add brown sugar and granulated sugar to browned butter. Using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat until incorporated, about 1 minute. Add eggs and vanilla and beat until mixture lightens and begins to thicken, about 30 seconds. Reduce mixer speed to low; add dry ingredients and beat just to combine. Mix in toffee pieces and chocolate wafers with a wooden spoon or a rubber spatula.
Let dough sit at room temperature at least 30 minutes to allow the flour to hydrate. Dough will look very loose at first, but will thicken as it sits. For less spread, chill dough in fridge.
Place a rack in middle of oven; preheat to 375°. Using a 1½-oz. ice cream scoop, portion out 10 balls of dough and place on a parchment-lined baking sheet, spacing about 3" apart (you can also form dough into ping pong–sized balls with your hands). Do not flatten; cookies will spread as they bake. Sprinkle with sea salt.
Bake cookies until edges are golden brown and firm but centers are still soft, 9–11 minutes. Let cool on baking sheets 10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack and let cool completely. Repeat with remaining dough and a fresh parchment-lined baking sheet to make 10 more cookies.
Do Ahead: Cookie dough can be made 3 days ahead; cover and chill. Let dough come to room temperature before baking.
Notes
To create ridges in cookies, at 7 minutes open oven and rap pan on oven rack which will cause cookie to deflate and create ridges.
