Sunday, May 20, 2007

Chocolate chips, and a cookie recipe


OK, so chocolate is chocolate. Chocolate chips are a marvelous way to keep chocolate in your life when you need to pretend that it doesn't really revolve around chocolate.
Ghirardelli make some of the best chocolate chips around. Their 60% Cacao Bittersweet Chocolate Chips (formerly known as Double Chocolate Chips) are my favorites for baking.
When I can't get good chocolate chips, which is all the time in Germany, I chop up chocolate bars and use chunks instead. My favorite bars for making chocolate chunks are Milka for milk chocolate and Lidl's Madagaskar for dark chocolate. I use milk chocolate chips very sparingly, generally only when someone requests them, because I believe semisweet offers the best contrast to the baked goods.
Here is my very own Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookie recipe, pictured above. Enjoy!
Miss Charlotte’s Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies
1 cup pecans, toasted
½ cup finely chopped coconut
¾ cup unsalted butter, room temperature
¾ cup light brown sugar
¼ cup vanilla sugar
1 large egg
1 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup raisins
3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
optional: 1 or 2 teaspoonfuls of milk
1 cup dark chocolate chips

Toast nuts by putting them in a medium oven (about 350 degrees) for about 10 minutes. Let cool. Keep oven at 350.

Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.

Cream butter and sugars with a mixer.
Add the egg and beat until mixed.

In a separate bowl, stir the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and raisins. Coating the raisins keeps them from sticking together in one lump.

Add the flour mixture to the creamed mixture a little at a time and beat until incorporated. Feel free to run the mixer a little hard. The raisins will only make the cookies taste better if they are a little broken up.

Add the oats a little at a time. Add up to a teaspoonful of milk if the dough seems too thick. It will still be a very stiff dough.

Break the nuts into pieces directly into the bowl. Stir into the dough.
Gently fold the chocolate chips into the dough last. Don’t stir too much, or you'll bruise the chocolate.

Use a rounded teaspoonful of dough per cookie. Press the cookie a little flat, because they won’t flow very much.

Bake the cookies for about 12 minutes, or until light golden brown around the edges. Cool as long as you can stand it. Remember a burnt tongue can't taste as well.

Makes about 30-36 cookies.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Yummy! The toasted pecans were a hit along with the dark chocolate. They didn't last 5 days around the house!
thanks for the recipe - it's a keeper.
Sandy