Chocolate Chip Cookies. Could there be anything more comforting and delicious? Probably not. Everyone has their favourite and I know it can be hard to convert people, but this batch should at least make it to your short list!
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Now when I say these are my favourite chocolate chip cookies, I mean of course my favourite plain, regular, standard chocolate chip cookies. This is an important distinction since obviously there are also Oatmeal Chocolate Chip cookies, and Double Chocolate Chip cookies, and basically any other cookie that I feel deserves chocolate.
But for those days when you just need a simple cookie hug, these are my favourite.
For a very long time, while in college and for a few years afterwards, I lived with room mates. Room mates who would say to me, “Oh you bake! I love eating cookies/cakes/insert whatever I was baking here!” So I would bake, and then they would eat one or two and then not eat anymore. Which is a real problem because it would cause me to eat all of them! Not so great for my waistline, I must say.
Don’t get me wrong, I would continue to bake things and either force them upon roommates, or simply pawn them off at work places. It is just so much more fun when you get to watch someone enjoying your treats you know?
The good thing about all this baking for others was that I got to experiment with many recipes. Through this time I was either in culinary school, or working in a few different bakeries and kitchens, but at a job you don’t get to experiment too much. Mostly they want you to make their recipes and not deviate too much. So testing recipes at home was more fun.
When I was growing up, my mom baked the chocolate chip cookie recipe on the back of the Chippits bag, and honestly, we loved it. Good job Chippits, good job. But in terms of recipes it isn’t the greatest that I’ve tasted and experimenting with cookies is delicious.
This recipe is a Frankenstiens’ monster of a recipe. I made so many over the years my little hand written notebook of recipes is bursting with scraps of paper, clippings from magazines with bits crossed out and circled and note cards with alterations. The recipe probably doesn’t look like there was that much work put into it, but trust me, I’ve put serious though into this. The result? Chewy soft centered cookies with crisp buttery outsides, and speckles of rich chocolate.
Note: My current job is a Chocolate Maker. So access to extremely high quality chocolate isn’t an issue for me. I strongly suggest that if you can find very high quality baking chocolate, you use it for this recipe. I know, here at Hummingbird at least, you can find some. But if that’s a bit far for you then do your best.
You’ll notice that I also use Milk Chocolate in this recipe. The milk chocolate we make at Hummingbird is 60% cacao and therefore has a much more intense chocolate flavour and is less sweet. This works very well with this recipe, but I’ve made it with Semi sweet baking chocolate as well as 70% dark chocolate and its equally as tasty. So don’t be afraid to use whatever chocolate is available to you.
Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 lb Unsalted Butter, Softened
- 1 3/4 cup Granulated Sugar
- 2 1/4 cup Packed, light Brown Sugar
- 4 Eggs
- 6 cup All Purpose Flour
- 1 tbsp Salt
- 2 tsp Baking Powder
- 2 tsp Baking Soda
- 1 tsp Almond Extract
- 2 lb Milk Chocolate, Chopped
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 350F. Line baking sheets with parchment, and set aside.
- In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugars until they are pale and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well between each addition. Finally, add the almond extract.
- In a separate large bowl, sift together the dry ingredients. Then add them to your wet ingredients, stirring carefully to make sure flour doesn't go everywhere. Don't fully combine the mix at this point because...
- Next you will add your chocolate! If you fully mix the dough before the chocolate goes in, the cookies will have a more dense texture. So only fully mix the dough once that chocolate goes in.
- Decide now how large you want your cookies. I like ours to be about 3" in diameter so that they make a solid snack for Hubby to bring to work with him. So i use my hands and make little balls about the size of ping pong balls and then gently flatten them slightly into discs.
- Arrange on a baking sheet, and bake for about 12 minutes, turning halfway through. What you want is for them to be slightly golden, puffed, and appear not quite cooked in the middle. When you take them out they will settle a bit and finish cooking without getting dry. Move them to a cooling rack and enjoy! I usually freeze a bunch of these, and if you'd like to as well, just wait until they are fully cooled then popped them into large ziplocks, and they freeze beautifully.
If you end up making these and like them as much as I do, let me know!
LizaLeigh
