Half Chocolate Chip and Half Chocolate With White Chip Cookies
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The incredibly kind people over at The Harvard Common Press must have known I was on a self imposed cookbook purchasing hiatus because they offered to send me four cookbooks, all part of the “Baker’s Field Guide” series. They even have a pull quote from David Lebovitz on the covers. I was sold.
Side note: I’ll be giving away a set of these cookbooks soon, so stay tuned for a chance to win!
One of the books was all chocolate chip cookie recipes, and my eyes immediately went to the “half and half cookies,” perfect for those of us who have trouble making up our minds when it comes to cookie flavors! The cookie is half chocolate chip, half rich chocolate with white chocolate chips and is chewy and absolutely delicious. My coworkers ate them up in no time, and everyone keep saying how good they are. They’re definitely worth the extra time it took to roll all the dough balls.
Ingredients
2 cups plus 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1 cup semisweet chocolate morsels
3 tablespoons Dutch-processed unsweetened cocoa powder, sifted
1 cup white chocolate morsels
Photos of the process here.
Preparation
Whisk 2 cups of the flour, the baking soda, and salt together in a medium-size bowl.
In a large bowl with an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter until creamy, about 2 minutes. Add granulated sugar and brown sugar gradually, beating until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes, and scraping down bowl once or twice. Beat in vanilla, then eggs, one at a time, scraping down bowl. Add about one-third of flour mixture and mix on low speed. Gradually add remaining flour mixture, mixing just until blended.
Divide mixture in half. To one half, beat in remaining 3 tablespoons flour and the semisweet chocolate morsels. To the other half, beat in sifted cocoa and white chocolate morsels. Cover with plastic wrap and chill doughs separately at least 2 hours or overnight.
Preheat oven to 375 F. Line 2 cookie sheets with parchment paper.
Take rounded teaspoons of each type of chilled dough and roll it into a ball. (My dough was a little sticky so I measured out the first dough one teaspoon at a time, made balls from it, put the dough balls back in the fridge, then measured out the second dough the same way.)
Press the balls together, side by side, so you can see both colored doughs. Gently form this cookie into a ball. Place on prepared cookie sheets 2 inches apart so that doughs remain side by side. Bake until edges and tops just begin to turn light golden brown, about 12 minutes. Place sheets on racks to cool for 5 minutes, then remove cookies from sheets and place directly on racks to cool completely.
Yields 52 cookies. (Or more, if you make them smaller like I did.)
Recipe from A Baker’s Field Guide to Chocolate Chip Cookies by Dede Wilson.
Peanut Butter Filled Chocolate Cookies
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One of the first food blogs I ever read was Culinary in the Desert (now called Culinary in the Country) who regularly shares amazing recipes and photos. This recipe is no exception. Fans of chocolate and peanut butter, pay attention!
Imagine: A soft, rich, chocolate cookie filled with a peanut butter filling similar to that of a Reese’s peanut butter cup. Plus, tiny specks of sugar on top. Chocolate and peanut butter–the perfect combination. Go make these now.
Photos of the process here.
p.s. Giveaway coming soon: The super nice folks at Trudeau sent me a huge box of amazing baking supplies. (My favorite are the silicone pinch prep bowls.) Stay tuned for your chance to win!
Dough Ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
8 tablespoons (1/2 cup or 1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup peanut butter
1 large egg
1 tablespoon milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
Filling Ingredients
3/4 cup sifted confectioners’ sugar
1/2 cup peanut butter
pinch salt
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
Dough Preparation
Preheat oven to 350. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt.
In a large mixing bowl, beat together butter, sugars and peanut butter until smooth and creamy. Mix in egg, milk and vanilla, beating until well combined. Add dry ingredients and mix just until combined. Form the dough into 32 balls.
Filling Preparation
In a medium bowl, mix together confectioners’ sugar, peanut butter and salt until smooth. Form into 32 balls.
Working on a silpat or piece of parchment, gently flatten each chocolate ball. Top each round with a peanut butter ball, then carefully fold chocolate dough over the peanut butter ball and seal the edges. Roll dough into a ball.
Place balls on a parchment or silpat-lined baking sheet. Lightly flatten with the bottom of a glass dipped in the remaining 2 tablespoons granulated sugar.
Place pans into the oven and bake until the surface of the cookies begins to slightly crack, about 8 minutes. Remove and allow cookies to cool for 1 minute on the baking sheet. Transfer cookies to a wire rack and allow to cool completely.
Makes 32 cookies.
Recipe from Culinary in the Country.
Compost Cookie Bars (AKA Break Up Cookies)
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Note: This post contains a very brief story of my recent breakup as well as what I did and did not eat while in NYC. If you’re only interested in the recipe, skip to here.
I found out on a Thursday that I would be going to NYC for a conference and to see clients the following Monday, so I quickly made a list of restaurants and bakeries I wanted to visit while I was there. On my list was of course Momofuku, home of the Crack Pie I made a while back. I’ve been curious to try their compost cookies which I had heard contain potato chips, pretzels, and much, much more. Seeing as how I’ve enjoyed Ben & Jerry’s Late Night Snack which has chocolate covered potato chips in it, I figured the compost cookies would be a no brainer.
Unfortunately, things then turned south. The day before I was to leave, my boyfriend/guinea pig and I broke up quite unexpectedly, and my body decided to go on a break up diet. The one where you can’t eat, not the one where you eat everything in sight. This did not bode well with my plans to eat my way through New York.
So. What I did not eat: Anything from Momofuku, soft pretzels, warm nuts, black and white cookies, macarons, cupcakes, good pizza. What I did eat bites of: Pizza from the food court at the Javits Center (blech), a lobster sandwich and french fries from The Mermaid Inn (apparently I do like lobster), a bunch of different things including salad, pita and spreads, and chicken from a Greek place called Kefi. Then just when I got hungry enough to eat a full meal, I realized my hotel was literally a foot away from Shake Shack, a place Nicole of Cake & Heels and I had just been talking about the week before. I had the best chicken hot dog (I don’t eat red meat) of my life and the shack sauce I got with the fries was insanely addictive. It’s seriously like crack for french fries.
Disappointed I didn’t get to visit Momofuku, and in phase two (wine, sweet, and salty) of the break up diet, I decided to make the compost cookies myself when I got back in town. After reading dozens of blog posts about flat cookies that spread, I figured I’d give them a shot baking them in a pan and slicing them into bars.
My attempt was a success! I brought these cookies to a get together on Saturday and they were gobbled up in no time. The cookie itself is chewy, salty, sweet, and the pretzels gave it a nice crunch. I think the potato chips were a little lost with all of the peanut butter, but the pretzels definitely added some wow factor.
Ingredients
1 cup unsalted butter
1 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup light brown sugar
1 Tbsp corn syrup
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp Kosher salt
1 1/2 cups your favorite baking ingredients (I used peanut butter cups, peanut butter chips, and chocolate chips)
1 1/2 cups your favorite snack foods (I used potato chips and pretzels)
Preparation
In a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, cream butter, sugars and corn syrup on medium high for two to three minutes until fluffy and pale yellow in color. Scrape down the sides with a spatula.
On a lower speed, add eggs and vanilla to incorporate. Increase mixing speed to medium-high and start a timer for 10 minutes. During this time the sugar granules will fully dissolve, the mixture will become an almost pale white color and your creamed mixture will double in size.
When time is up, on a lower speed, add the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Mix 45 – 60 seconds just until your dough comes together and all remnants of dry ingredients have incorporated. Do not walk away from your mixer during this time or you will risk over mixing the dough. Scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl with a spatula.
On the same low speed, add in the hodgepodge of your favorite baking ingredients and mix for 30 – 45 seconds until they evenly mix into the dough. Add in your favorite snack foods last, paddling again on low speed until they are just incorporated.
Spread batter into 9×13 pan. (I lined my pan with non-stick foil and used an offset spatula to spread.) Bake at 350 and check after 30 minutes. (I can’t remember if mine took 30 or 35 minutes to bake through, sorry!) Let cool then cut into bars.
Recipe adapted from The Amateur Gourmet.
Chocolate Caramel Oat Bars
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Not to bore you with excuses as to why I haven’t been blogging lately, but I’ve been busy! The weather is gorgeous, I’m going out with friends, and I have an awesome new guinea pig boyfriend! (So far he has liked everything I’ve baked, he’s a good guy.)
Anyway, as you probably know by now, I love anything oat, chocolate, and caramel so I was excited to try these. Apparently something has happened to my taste buds (too much sour candy?) because I didn’t find these terribly exciting. I tried them warm, chilled, and at room temp and while I didn’t think they were bad, I didn’t think they were amazing either. However–my boyfriend and coworkers thought they were delicious, and all day at work people were saying they definitely ranked up there when it comes to treats I’ve brought into the office. So ignore me and make these. You will make people happy.
Oat Base Ingredients
3/4 cup (3.4 oz) all-purpose flour
1 ½ cups quick cooking oats
1 generous pinch salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
6 oz (1 ½ sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1/3 cup chopped chocolate
Filling Ingredients
2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons unsalted butter
1 1/3 cups Kraft caramel bits or 32 unwrapped caramels
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line an 8 inch square metal pan with non-stick foil.
Mix the flour, oats, salt, baking soda and brown sugar together in a mixing bowl. Add butter and stir with a spoon or mix with fingers until mixture is thoroughly mixed – dough should just start to come together. Reserve a little less than half of the mixture and put it in the refrigerator. Press remaining oat mixture into bottom of pan and bake 10-12 minutes or until set. Let cool for at least 15 minutes.
Make caramel filling. In a microwave-safe bowl, melt the butter. Add the caramel bits and stir to coat with butter. Microwave on high for 30 seconds. Stir and repeat until caramel is melted. Pour it over the base.
Sprinkle chilled reserved crumb mixture over top and bake for 10-12 minutes or until top layer is cooked. Remove from oven and immediately sprinkle extra chocolate chips over the top. Let cool completely, then lift from pan and cut with a Chef’s knife.
Makes 16 squares.
Recipe adapted from Cookie Madness.
Chocolate-Chunk Caramel Cookies
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I’ve missed you guys! Between business travel and the flu, I haven’t been able to spend time in the kitchen lately. It sucked. Fortunately the flu is gone (save for the annoying cough that always seems to linger) and the kitchen has been calling my name! And to make things even sweeter, I discovered three bags of Kraft Caramel Bits in my pantry.
I searched for recipes using these caramely bits of yumminess, and finally discovered this one. At first glance, these cookies are very unassuming. In fact, they’re even a little ugly. But when you take a bite, you realize these are no ordinary chocolate chip cookies. In addition to chocolate, there’s a rich buttery caramel that takes you by surprise.
Now, before you run to your pantry to make sure you have ingredients to make these, I do have one gripe. If the cookies aren’t eaten straight from the oven, the caramel gets kind of hard. OK fine, really hard. And it sticks to your teeth in that super annoying way. Fortunately, this can all be easily remedied by putting the cookies in the microwave for a few seconds, but who wants to have to do that? And for those of you wondering if I would make these again, let me just say this: At 5:00 half of the cookies were still in the kitchen at the office, and we all know what that means.
Totally unrelated to the cookie recipe: The nice folks at restaurantware.com must have known that the butter in cookies is ruining the backdrops for my photo studio because they sent me a bunch of different mini serving pieces to use for my food photo shoots. How cool is that? You should check out their site, they have some fun pieces!
Ingredients
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
2 large eggs
6 ounces fine-quality bittersweet chocolate, chopped coarse
18 caramels (about 1 cup), I used Kraft Caramel Bits
Preparation
- Preheat oven to 325°F.
- In a bowl whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. In another bowl with an electric mixer cream butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition, and beat in flour mixture.
- Lightly dust chocolate and caramel with flour then stir into dough. Drop rounded tablespoons about 2 inches apart onto baking sheets. Bake cookies in batches in middle of oven 12 to 15 minutes, or until golden. Cool cookies on baking sheets on racks until firm. Cookies keep in airtight containers 5 days.
Yields approximately 50 cookies.
Recipe adapted from Epicurious.
