Posts Tagged cookie recipe

Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies with Sea Salt and Thyme

I’ve officially been a mom for over 3 months. Time flies when you’re having fun, and it especially flies when you’re sleep deprived and love-drunk on a tiny little human. Motherhood is crazy that way.

Right at the 3 month mark, I felt a distinct change. I started to feel normal again. The baby started sleeping a night (for more than a couple of hours at a time!). I wasn’t a pro at motherhood, by any means, but I felt like I was getting the hang of things. And that’s precisely when disaster struck: my computer died. My hard drive failed and the data was deemed unrecoverable. Thankfully, I had a lot saved to cloud storage and have hard copies of some of my important documents and photos. It certainly could have been a lot worse. But, still. My computer died. It wasn’t fun.

Then, in the midst of dealing with the fallout from my computer dying, the baby got her first cold. I know, I know. It’s just a cold. It shouldn’t be a big deal, but somehow it is? They’re just so little and tiny and helpless and it’s hard to see them feel crummy. And, when the baby feels crummy she doesn’t sleep well (and when the baby doesn’t sleep well, nobody sleeps well). So, that wasn’t fun either.

I could tell you more about my rotten week, but it would probably bore you. You know how it is. Sometimes life is exhausting and unpredictable, and you just have to go with it. That’s the way the cookie crumbles. And that, my friends, is exactly how I’ll segue way into talking about this cookie recipe. (Like how I did that?!?)

Truth be told, I had a lot of recipes and ideas to share with you all. And then my computer died, and a lot of those recipes/photos/etc died with it. So, I went back to the drawing board and I found myself wanting to make something simple, classic, and comforting. So I made a big ole batch of dark chocolate chunk cookies. These cookies are nothing new or exciting, but they were exactly what I needed. They’re rich and chewy, speckled with dark chocolate, sea salt, and thyme. I can say with all honesty that these are the best cookies I have ever made.

One of these days, I’ll get back to blogging regularly. I’ll (hopefully) post inspiring seasonal recipes and drool-worthy photos. I’ll find my rhythm and I’ll find the time. Until then, please enjoy this chocolate chip cookie recipe.

DARK CHOCOLATE CHUNK COOKIES WITH SEA SALT + THYME

Recipe inspired by Baking Bird

Ingredients:

2 sticks salted butter, softened

3/4 cup light brown sugar

2/3 cup white sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 large eggs

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon dried thyme

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

12 ounces (or more!) of quality dark chocolate*, roughly chopped

Optional: flake sea salt, for sprinkling atop the cookies

*I used a mixture of random dark chocolate bars I had in the pantry, but most of the chocolate was from local chocolate purveyor, Woodblock Chocolate.

Method:

Preheat oven to 350 F. Line a baking sheet with parchment or a Silpat.

In a large bowl (or the base of a stand mixer), mix together the butter and sugars until fluffy. Mix in the eggs and vanilla until combined.

In another bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, salt, and thyme. Stir the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, mix until combined. Fold in the dark chocolate chunks.

Spoon the dough into evenly sized balls (about 1 tablespoon each), and place 2″ apart on the prepared baking sheet. Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until golden brown.

Remove from the oven and cool cookies on a wire rack. Top with flake sea salt, if desired.

Salted Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies (Oh, you fancy!)

As I was baking these cookies, I had Drake’s song, “Fancy, ” stuck in my head. The words kept running through my mind, over and over: “Oh, you fancy, huh?”

Why yes, Drake, I am fancy.

(Truth be told, I’m not all that fancy. But these cookies? They’re pretty darn fancy.)

I took a relatively simple recipe for Salty Chocolate Chunk Cookies, and I fancied them up a bit. I am not going to post a full recipe here, rather, I’ll just share my edits and changes to this classic chocolate chunk cookie:

*I used a combination of Mast Brothers Crown Maple Chocolate and Woodblock Venezuelan Dark Chocolate. (The whole reason I decided to make these cookies is because I had odd ends and bits of a few different specialty chocolate bars, so I decided to chop them up and make the best cookies ever.)

*I used a coarse and flaky sea salt from a local Oregon salt producer, Jacobsen’s Salt Co.

*I used duck eggs instead of chicken eggs!

*I skipped the powdered sugar and upped the brown sugar, plus I added a teaspoon of blackstrap molasses.

*Lastly, I added in 1 tablespoon of fresh thyme leaves into the batter.

And that, my friends, is how I made fancy cookies. I was really pleased with the end result — they were chewy and chocolaty with just a touch of salt. (Next time, I might add a bit more thyme as the flavor got a bit lost next to the dark chocolate and sea salt).

I encourage you to play with the recipe and come up with your own fancy alterations. When it comes to chocolate chip cookies, it’s hard to go wrong. Stick with the basic sugar, flour, egg, and butter proportions — but the rest is up to you, my friends. Be fancy.

Chai Snickerdoodles

We made it through the holidays! High fives all around.

Granted, my house is in shambles and my pants feel like they are two sizes too small. But that’s what the holidays are all about, right? In all seriousness, I had a wonderful Christmas. I spent a lot of quality time with my family (and adorable nieces), I ate a lot good food, and played a lot of Just Dance 3. (In case you were wondering, I’m absolutely horrible at Just Dance 3.)

However, the holidays aren’t technically over yet. We still have to ring in the new year! I’m not one for New Year’s resolutions – namely, I don’t like making promises I can’t keep – but I do plan on making a few dietary changes on January 1st. No, I am not going on a diet. I’m just going back to the way I normally eat. I like eating fruits, veggies, and whole grains. I feel better when I eat healthy and exercise (call me crazy, but I actually like feeling good). So, I’m going to listen to my body and I’m going to cut back on sugar, carbs, alcohol, etc.

But, that starts on January 1st. Meaning: I’ve got a few more days to eat cookies. And so do you!

So make these cookies now and gobble them up before your New Year’s resolutions begin. ;)

P.S. I’m aware that these cookies may appear to be sprinkled with black pepper, but I can assure you that they are sprinkled with Chai tea leaves (and cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, etc). And I can assure you that they are really, really delicious.

CHAI SNICKERDOODLES
Adapted from The Novice Chef

2 1/3 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons cream of tartar**
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup unsalted butter (2 sticks), room temperature
1 1/2 cups white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs

**If you do not have cream of tartar, you can substitute a 1/2 teaspoon of lemon juice.

For the Chai sugar:
5 tablespoons white sugar
2 teaspoons Masala chai tea leaves (Use loose leaf, or empty the contents of a couple of tea bags)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon cardamom
1/4 teaspoon ginger
1/8 teaspoon cloves
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg

Method:
Using a food processor or mortar & pestle, grind the Chai tea until it is fine. Combine chai with the sugar and other spices in a small bowl. Set aside.

In another (medium) bowl, combine dry ingredients.

Using a stand mixer (or hand mixer), cream together butter until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time. Add in vanilla (and lemon juice, if substituting for cream of tartar).

Slowly add dry ingredients to wet ingredients, and mix until combined. Place dough in refrigerator to chill for a half hour.

Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper (or a Silpat).

Once the dough has chilled, remove from fridge. Using your hands, form dough into large balls (about 1″). Roll each ball in the chai sugar mix, and place on a baking sheet (leave space, as the cookies will expand during baking). Bake for 12-14 minutes, until edges are just barely beginning to turn golden brown. Allow cookies to rest for 5 minutes on cookie sheet before transferring to a cooling rack.