Category Archives: cookies

Springtime Happiness Cookie Cake

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Yesterday I walked all the way from Beacon Hill to Fort Point Channel to the Public Garden (that’s like, all of Boston) without. wearing. a coat.

Do you know what this means??? SPRING HAS SPRUNG.

#happydance

DSC_0171#happydance #happydance

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#HAPPYDANCE

So full of happy, in fact, that I finally concluded my blogging hiatus, dusted off my sprinkle cabinet, and baked you a giant cookie! So many colors! So much happy!

I know I’m like every other person in the world when I say I didn’t know I was in a deep dark cold-weather depression until I finally felt the warmth of the sun, but really? Can we ever talk about it enough? SPRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING. Blue skies and birds chirping! Colorful flowers and leaves on trees! NO MORE MITTENS!

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Also #happydance-inducing?? I baked this cookie using coconut oil instead of butter and it is reeeeal good. And there are rainbow sprinkles inside. Doo-dee-doo-dee-dooooo.

DSC_0158Springtime Happiness Cookie Cake (adapted from this cookie pie)

yield: one 9-inch cookie cake

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup coconut oil (or unsalted butter) at room temperature
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 cup white whole wheat flour
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup dark chocolate M&Ms (or semisweet chocolate chips)
  • A handful of sprinkles, if you’re feeling extra happy

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Generously grease (or coat with cooking spray) a 9-inch* round cake pan. In a medium bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the coconut oil and brown sugar together until smooth. Add the egg and vanilla; beat until fully combined.
  2. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and add the flour, baking powder, and salt. Stir on low until the ingredients just come together; add 3/4 of the M&Ms and sprinkles and stir until incorporated.
  3. Press the dough into the greased pan. Top with remaining 1/4 cup M&Ms. Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until the edges are golden brown. Cool completely** on a wire rack, then remove from the pan and serve.

*You can use an 8-inch or 10-inch cake pan, whatever you have on hand. Just adjust the time by a few minutes (longer bake time for 8-inch, shorter for 10-inch) to account for the different size.

**Or.. don’t let it cool, top it with vanilla ice cream, and eat it straight from the pan. ;)

Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies

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DSC_0180Lately I’ve been having tons of food revelations.

It started with kale chips. I’m pretty sure I’m the last being on earth to hop on the kale chip train. Like, WHAT have I been waiting for???? Kale chips are like eating air!!! Delicious, nutritious, super crispy air. I want kale chips all day every day UNTIL THE END OF TIME. Please remind me of this the next time I start resisting a trend.DSC_0168DSC_0154

Next: hard-boiled eggs. Umm…yeah. I really don’t have an excuse. I think I thought they weren’t good so I never bothered trying them but…WHY?! They make my salad 2352353262 bajillion times better! And more filling! Eggs!

Aside: I’ve decided I want to get chickens! We’ll talk about this later.

And speaking of salads… my sister recently introduced me to fresh peas on my salads. HELLO. I love how they *pop!* when you bite into them. The last time I ate peas I was 10 and had been pushing them around my plate for at least 2 hours, refusing to eat the one last bite that would release me from the dinner table. What was I thinking???? Peas! Duh! Yum!

Um, also? Lentils. I want to knock myself over the head. LENTILS ARE MAD YUMMY AND GOOD FOR YOU, MELANIE. WAKE UP. Cooked in a little vegetable broth and served with cous cous? Eeeeeattmeee.DSC_0153

And finally….baking without flour. Who knew it was possible? I certainly did NOT. I always thought the rules of baking were:

  1. Butter
  2. Sugar
  3. Eggs
  4. Flour
  5. Vanilla

So it came as a total surprise when I decided to bake cookies sans rule #4 and they came out AMAZINGLY.

W-O-W. Chewy ooey gooey melty goodness.

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Have you had any food revelations? What other delicious things am I missing out on??!

Flourless Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies (adapted very lightly from Martha Stewart)

yield: about 24 cookies

Ingredients

  • 1 cup chunky unsalted peanut butter (you could also use smooth or honey roasted, but I liked the texture of chunky PB best)
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the peanut butter, brown sugar, egg, and vanilla on medium until smooth. Stir in the baking soda and salt until well combined. Stir in the chocolate chips.
  2. Roll the dough into balls, one heaping tablespoon* at a time. Place on a cookie sheet and bake for about 12 minutes, until the edges are golden brown. Don’t let them overcook - you want them to be a bit gooey inside! Remove from the oven and allow to cool on a wire rack.

*I wanted my cookies to be a bit bigger so I made roughly 1 1/2-2 tablespoon balls of dough. If you do this, make sure to add about a minute of baking time.

A Teeny-Tiny Batch of Eensy-Weensy Chocolate Chip Cookies

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I will never be someone who can eat just one cookie. Some people (i.e. those with self-control) can do it. Me? If I have one cookie, I want fifteen more just like it. On the other hand, I like the idea of a portion-controlled single-serving cookie, à la those “giant cookie[s] for one” that I see all over the blogworld. So I decided to combine portion control + my love of multiple (multiplemultiple) cookies and figured out the measurements for a teeny-tiny batch of eensy-weensy cookies.

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image_5These are perfect for any time life calls for a tiny batch of cookies. Like when you MUST HAVE some fresh-from-the-oven goodies but you don’t want to make a normal-sized batch and accidentally-on-purpose eat two dozen. Or when you’ve had a long Tuesday and want to drown your sorrows in warm chocolate chip cookies but you only have ten minutes and two tablespoons of butter and one bowl. Because that’s all you NEED for these, yo.

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And…THEY ARE JUST SO DARN CUTE. They fill me with happiness. Ideal happy Melanie moment: dancing around my kitchen to this song wearing a high pony munching on a batch of teeny tiny eensy weensy adorable-beyond-words cookies. On vacation. And there are sprinkles somewhere close by. And it’s sunny outside. And Mike comes home early from work and makes me dinner. It’s grilled cheese. And he brings a puppy. It’s going to be mine-all-mine and I name it….

image_3…I’m getting ahead of myself. I just can’t even handle the cuteness. There’s something about miniature baked goods that make me do a happy dance. Like, each cookie is ONE TEASPOON of dough. Cutie cute cute cute cute CUUUUUUTE.

image_2imageA Teeny-Tiny Batch of Eensy-Weensy Chocolate Chip Cookies

yield: 18-20 teeny tiny cookies

Ingredients

  • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, browned (or melted) and cooled slightly
  • 2 tablespoons brown sugar
  • 1 tablespoon white sugar
  • 1/4 teaspoon vanilla
  • 2 teaspoons egg*
  • 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1/8 teaspoon baking soda
  • pinch of salt
  • 1/8 cup mini chocolate chips

*note: to get 2 teaspoons of egg, crack an egg into a bowl, beat it with a fork, and measure out 2 teaspoons

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. In a medium bowl, whisk the slightly cooled butter, brown sugar, white sugar, and vanilla. Add the egg and whisk until smooth. Add the flour, baking soda, and salt; stir together with a rubber spatula or wooden spoon. Fold in the chocolate chips.
  2. Drop the dough by teaspoonfuls onto a baking sheet. Bake for four minutes (watch carefully, these bake quickly!!), then place on a wire rack to cool.

Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies

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image_3This past weekend, I made a cake and frosting combo that called for EIGHT STICKS OF BUTTER. Two pounds, four cups, sixty-four tablespoons. Uh. Yuh.

The cake was obvi a huge hit but when it came time for me to bake some cookies (weekly ritual) my thighs, arteries, and life were like NO MORE BUTTAH. Buttah cleanse please! So I set off to make a cookie sans butter. And eggs. And white flour. And extra sugar.

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And so, my very first vegan cookies were born. Now I’m not going to sit here and tell you that these cookies taste exactly like your standard butter-laden chocolate chip cookie (because NOTHING compares to the good stuff) but I will say that they are quite delicious in their own way. The coconut oil gives them a buttery feel and the almond flour produces a crispy-crumbly-hearty texture. And the flavor! I have been sitting here trying to describe the flavor for at least 20 minutes and all I have come up with is gooooood. Like a nutty buttery [healthy! shh.] chocolate chip cookie ball. Real gooooood.

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OH! And best of all? These babies are so super quick and easy to make!! One-bowl-wonder!

Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies

yield: about 2 dozen

Ingredients

  • 1 cup coconut oil, at room temperature
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons almond milk (or soy or regular, whatever you prefer)
  • 1 cup almond flour/almond meal
  • 1 cup white whole wheat flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 cup semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips*

*Let’s be real: I didn’t have vegan chocolate chips on hand so these cookies are not *technically* 100% vegan. But if you have vegan choco chips they will be!

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a medium bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the coconut oil and brown sugar until combined. Add the vanilla and almond milk and stir to blend.
  2. Add the almond flour, whole wheat flour, baking soda, and salt. Mix on medium speed until fully combined; stir in the chocolate chips. Roll the dough into one-inch balls and place on a cookie sheet. Use your palm to flatten them slightly. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until the edges are brown and the tops have started to turn golden (almond flour browns more quickly than regular flour, so don’t be alarmed if they look a little darker than usual around the edges!)
  3. Allow the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for at least 15 minutes. The almond flour gives them a crumbly texture, so if you try to remove them from the cookie sheet when they’re still hot you’ll end up with a crumbled cookie mess (learned that the hard way). Carefully transfer the warm cookies to a wire rack to cool. I think these are most delicious served slightly warm!

M&M Candy Cane Cookies

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M&M cookies3.jpgThe best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear!

M&M cookies5.jpgAnd baking cookies for all to eat.

All the cookies. All the cheer. All. The. Time.

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Lately the kids in my class have been fa-reak-ing-out over Christmas. Yesterday one of our Christmas angels brought in a picture of herself sitting on Santa’s lap at the mall and when I showed the class the picture one extra-excited Christmas lover screamed “SANTA!!!!!!!!” EXACTLY like Will Ferrell does in Elf. I literally waited for him to follow it up with “I KNOW HIM!!!!” because it was so, SO perfectly Buddy the Elf. Full of Christmas cheer and unadulterated CHRISTMAS-IS-COMING-AND-SO-IS-SANTA excitement.

I feel the same way kid, I feel the same. way.

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This sparked a 20-minute discussion of all the kiddos’ interactions with SANTA!!!!!! and their Elf on the Shelf’s recent movements. One Elf was discovered in the refrigerator this morning, “…eating all our food!”

Finally, one of the munchkins told us that when he went to visit Santa this past weekend, as he was saying goodbye Santa said, “And don’t forget to leave me some cookies!!”

Four-year-olds are THE best for spreading Christmas cheer. M&M cookies1.jpg

Wayfair recently contacted me to see if I wanted to be a part of the Wayfair/Peapod holiday bake-off, and since I can’t really go around screaming “SANTA!!!!!” like my cutie little class full of Christmas elves, I figured I would spread my Christmas cheer by baking up some [more] super festive cookies. Wayfair sent me a couple recipes to try (as well as a snowman cross-stitch which I am diligently working on every night. Hello skills learned in Girl Scouts circa 1997) and I adapted their “Festive Drop Cookies” to make them extra festive (Christmas M&Ms) and deeeelicious (candy canes). I brought half the batch into my school and sent the other half in to work with Mike - all the cookies (and all the cheer) were ingested in under an hour.

I heard Santa would REALLY like it if you left him these cookies on Christmas Eve ;)

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Festive M&M Candy Cane Cookies (adapted from Wayfair & Peapod’s “Festive Drop Cookies”)

yield: about four dozen cookies, depending on size

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
  • 1/2 cup vegetable shortening
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1 cup brown sugar, packed
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 2 eggs + 1 egg yolk
  • 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1/2 cup white whole wheat (or regular whole wheat) flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 1/2 cups holiday M&Ms (I used minis but regular sized M&Ms will work too)
  • 1/4 cup candy cane bits (you can just crush up a couple candy canes or look for candy cane bits in the bulk section of your grocery store)

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. In large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the butter, shortening, and sugars on medium high until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add eggs and vanilla, scrape down the sides of the bowl and beat until combined.
  2. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flours, baking soda, and salt. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and beat on low until it starts to come together; turn the mixer up to medium and beat until fully combined.
  3. In a small bowl, combine M&Ms and candy cane bits. Shape tablespoons of dough into balls; dip the top half of the dough balls into the M&M/candy cane mixture to coat. Place the dough, M&M side up, onto a baking sheet. Bake for 10 minutes or until the edges are just barely golden brown. Allow the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 2-3 minutes, then place on a wire rack to cool completely.

Chewy Chocolate Peppermint Cookies

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chocopeppermint.jpgA few weeks ago, I freaked out over these peppermint bark baking bits from Trader Joe’s (new vlog coming soon!!) and immediately invented a cookie recipe to shove them in. I’ve now made these cookies 18 (okay, 3) times in the past couple weeks and I can’t. get. enough. They taste like brownie batter with the slightest hint of peppermint and are dangerously addictive.

chocopeppermint4.jpgI made the mistake of bringing the entire first batch of cookies into work, leaving only one cookie for Mike to try, which officially makes me the meanest - I KNOW. So, the other night, we’re finishing up dinner and Mike has dropped roughly 1,000 hints about how much he would just looooove a chewy chocolate cookie and it’s toooo bad all the cookies ended up in someone ELSE’S belly, and I decide to redeem myself by whipping up another batch. At this point it’s 9PM and my bedtime is rapidly approaching, so I’m trying to make these cookies AFAP (as fast as possible. invented for the sake of this story), speeding around the kitchen like a Tazmanian devil. While the butter and sugar are spinning around inside the mixing bowl getting fluffy, I fling open the cabinet to grab the flour like a whirling dervish - thereby knocking the metal lid of my flour canister INTO THE MIXER WHICH IS ON. HIGH.

COOKIE DOUGH EXPLOSION. MELANIE CRYING. THE SOUND OF METAL SCRAPING METAL (a sound one hopes to never hear whilst BAKING). HELP. HELP. HELP.

If you have ever wondered what a cookie crime scene might look like, just imagine this:

Dough splattered onto every surface of your kitchen. Cocoa powder (which is im.poss.i.ble. to clean) sprayed across the counters and floor. Flour in your hair, eyes, and life.

chocopeppermint5.jpgAfter screaming for five seconds I had the clarity of mind to TURN OFF the mixer before it died a sad and messy death. Somehow I managed to salvage the few scoops of dough left at the bottom of the bowl to bake up a couple cookies, and all was well in the MJM household.

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The moral of the story? Make these delicious cookies, but don’t try to do it AFAP.

Chewy Chocolate Peppermint Cookies

yield: about 4 dozen cookies

Ingredients

  • 1 cup (2 sticks) butter
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 2 eggs + 2 egg yolks
  • 2 cups flour
  • 2/3 cup cocoa powder
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 2 cups peppermint bark baking bits (if you can’t find the bits, you could use a combo of chocolate chips and candy cane pieces)

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, beat butter and sugars on medium-high until fluffy, about 1 minute. Add vanilla, then scrape down the sides of the bowl and add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Scrape down the sides to incorporate ingredients as needed.
  2. In a separate bowl, add flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. Whisk to combine. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and stir on low speed until combined. Add the baking bits; stir until incorporated.
  3. Drop dough by rounded tablespoons onto a baking sheet. Bake for 8 minutes - do not over bake, or the cookies will be crispy instead of chewy! Allow to cool on a wire rack.

“Hurricane Irene” Cookies from Tate’s Bake Shop

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I have been on a seeeerious cookie kick for the past couple weeks months. Chocolate chip cookies, confetti cookies, oatmeal cookies, cranberry cookies, minty cookies, pumpkin cookies, salty cookies, Oreo cookies.

Cookie Monster = me. Me = Cookie Monster.

So when the awesome people behind Tate’s Bake Shop asked me if I wanted a copy of Kathleen King’s newest cookbook, Baking for Friends, and the chance to share a recipe with my readers, I was like, DOLLLLAAA MAKE ME HOLLLAAAA honey boo boo chiiild.

In other words, yes.

After bookmarking 75 recipes I wanted to try out (and making a delicious white chocolate cranberry loaf for Thanksgiving), I decided I wanted to share the “Hurricane Irene” cookies with you.

Because basically, they are just a compost dump for every delicious thing you might have in your cabinets. Chocolate chips? Check. Toasted pecans? Check. Coconut flakes? Got it. Toffee bits? Uuuhhhh HUH.

I also added some coffee grounds and cinnamon chips because I am a crazy cookie monstah.

To give a bit more background on the “Hurricane Irene” name, Kathleen notes, “In 2011, on the morning of Hurricane Irene, I felt that we might need some comforting cookies in the house, so I created a cookie with what was on hand. It turned out fantastic, chubby with lots of good stuff. At first bite, my son Justin remarked, ‘Oh, don’t give these to anyone!‘”

Exaaaactly. Except I’m giving you the recipe ’cause I just love ya oh so much! Feel free to add whatever delicious bits you happen to have hanging around :)

Hurricane Irene Cookies (reprinted with permission from Tate’s Bake Shop Baking for Friends)

yield: ~4 1/2 dozen cookies

Ingredients

  • 2 1/2 cups old-fashioned (rolled) oats
  • 1 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 3/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 pound (2 sticks) salted butter, softened at room temperature
  • 3/4 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
  • 1/4 cup granulated sugar
  • 2 large eggs, at room temperature
  • 2 tablespoons water
  • 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
  • 1 1/2 cups (9 ounces) semisweet chocolate chips
  • 1 cup unsweetened coconut flakes (not desiccated; available at natural food stores or online)*
  • 1 cup toasted and coarsely chopped pecans
  • 1/2 cup toffee bits

Directions

  1. Position the oven racks in the top third and center of the oven and preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Line 2 large rimmed baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
  2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the oats, flour, baking soda, and salt. In a large bowl, beat the butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar with an electric mixer set on high speed until combined, about 1 minute. One at a time, beat in the eggs, followed by the water and vanilla. With the mixer on low speed, mix in the oat mixture, just until combined. Mix in the chocolate chips, coconut, pecans, and toffee bits.
  3. Using 2 tablespoons per cookie, drop the dough 3 inches apart onto the prepared baking sheets. (Or use a 1-ounce food portion scoop to scoop the dough onto the baking sheets.) Refrigerate the remaining dough while you bake the first batch.
  4. Bake, rotating the positions, of the sheets from top to bottom and front to back halfway through baking, until the edges of the cookies are lightly browned, about 17 minutes.** The cookies should be soft; do not overbake. Let cool on the baking sheets for 5 minutes. Transfer to a wire cooling rack and let cool completely. Repeat with the remaining dough, on cooled baking sheets.

*I didn’t have any unsweetened coconut flakes, so I used sweetened shredded coconut.

**My oven might run hot, but my cookies only needed to bake for about 14 minutes.

Halloween Candy Cookie Bars

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A couple of good things happened in the past few days:

1. I finally bought Halloween candy. Never mind the fact that I live in an apartment building made up of only grown ups, because - much like my Frankenstorm prep - you can never be too prepared. Never mind the fact that said Halloween candy will certainly not last us until the actual day of Halloween. Never MIND the fact that there are 750 Butterfinger wrappers in my garbage can. Do you even KNOW how I feel about Butterfingers???? I want to hug them with my whole face. CHOMP.

2. MIKE PASSED THE BAR!!! This is very, very good news. We celebrated by getting a fancy drink in a fancy bar and congratulating ourselves on being grown ups and then hit up The Lower Depths and ate 500 $1 hot dogs and drank beer. Grown ups < not grown ups.

3. Frankenstorm cancelled school today!!!! I think this is karma for all the snow days we DIDN’T have last school year. Thank you, Sandy. Even though you have the saddest hurricane name.

4. Mike and I became addicted to Homeland and it is, to date, the only TV show we agree on. It’s also the only thing we’ve done in the past 4 days. IT. IS. SO. GOOD. Thank you, Showtime, for saving my TV-watching relationship.

So, anywho…I bought all this Halloween candy and said to myself, “Self? How can you add 4,000,000 more calories to Halloween?” And myself said, “Chop up your Butterfingers and Snickers and Kit-Kats and put them in a cookie dough blanket.” So I did.

Perhaps my sub-conscious is preparing me for the impending doom of Sad-Sandy? Like a chipmunk collects nuts for the winter, I collect calories in the form of cookie-candy bars for power outages. It’s biology. Delicious, delicious, biology.

Halloween Candy Cookie Bars (basic blondie recipe adapted from Smitten Kitchen)

yield: 16 squares

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
  • 1 cup brown sugar, packed
  • 1 egg
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup candy bars, chopped*

*I used my favorite Halloween candies: Butterfingers, Snickers, Kit-Kats and M&Ms, but feel free to add whichever candies are YOUR favorites!

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Coat an 8×8 pan with cooking spray (for even easier removal, line the pan with parchment paper and then coat with cooking spray).
  2. In a large bowl, whisk the melted butter and brown sugar. Add the egg and vanilla; whisk until smooth. Add the flour, baking powder, and salt; stir with a rubber spatula until mostly combined. Fold in the chopped candy bars.
  3. Spread the batter into prepared pan. Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until the edges are golden brown and the center is just set - it will seem pretty gooey but the bars will firm up as they cool. Cool completely before cutting into squares.

Salted Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies

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So… I started watching Grey’s Anatomy again. I went through a phase a few years ago where I was totally OVER Grey’s (much like the current phase I’m in where I’m OVER Facebook. [I know! The horror!]) but then I got my brother’s password to Netflix and didn’t already have enough ways to waste time so I figured…why not watch a whole 8 (9?) seasons of a TV show?

So WHY DIDN’T ANYONE ALERT ME TO THE FACT THAT GREY’S IS GOOD AGAIN???? I just watched the episode where (spoiler alert!) Henry dies and Meredith and Derek get Zola and that family gets hit by a car and the girl has to take her dad off of life support and…OMG. Sobbed my eyes out. Mike came home from work and was like “What happened?? Are you okay??!” and I was all, “Teddy! She didn’t know about Henry and she was operating and they lied to her and she didn’t even KNOW and it’s SO AWFUL!” and he was like…

“Please. Get. A real. Life.”

Which I really should do considering my days are spent having dance parties with growing the minds of 4-year-olds and baking millions of cookies and occasionally doing a yoga podcast and sitting on the couch sobbing over Grey’s Anatomy.

Then again, if I got a real life I probably wouldn’t have time to bake dark chocolate chunk cookies for my pretend internet friends, so this whole “not yet acting like a grown up” thing really is a win-win for all.

I made these cookies as an attempt to recreate the NUMMIEST cookies from Canto 6 in Jamaica Plain. Super chewy and buttery with dark chocolate chunks and specks of sea salt; these babies are perfection!

Salted Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies (adapted from Martha Stewart)

Ingredients

  • 2 sticks unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
  • 1 cup packed dark brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup white sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 2 1/4 cups bread flour*
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 1/2 cups dark chocolate chunks
  • Coarse sea salt, for sprinkling

*Bread flour gives these cookies their extra-chewy texture. If you don’t have bread flour, you could use all-purpose, but you will lose some of the chew!

Directions

  1. In a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the butter and sugars on high until light and fluffy. Scrape down the sides, then beat in the eggs and vanilla until fully combined.
  2. In a separate bowl, combine the bread flour, baking soda, and salt. Pour the flour mixture into the butter and sugar mixture and stir on low speed until the dough starts to come together. Turn the mixer off and add the chocolate chips; mix on low until incorporated.
  3. Put the dough into the fridge for about an hour. While the dough is chilling, preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Roll into 2-inch balls and drop onto an ungreased cookie sheet a few inches apart (the cookies will spread out while baking!). Sprinkle with a bit of coarsely ground sea salt. Bake for 9-11 minutes or until the edges are golden brown. Allow the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for a few minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.