Double Chocolate Cookies

I finally got around to making those double chocolate cookies from Baking With Julia, and they were good. Mine came out very light, soft, and intensely chocolate-flavored. I made a few slight adjustments to the original recipe. First off, instead of melting the chocolate in the hot butter, I melted the chocolate and butter separately. Reason being, a cookbook author and pastry chef recently told me that adding melted chocolate and melted butter separately, enhances the flavor of the chocolate in the final cookie. I haven’t noticed that to be true, but it was worth a try. The other change I made was rather than use 1 ½ tablespoons of instant coffee powder, I just used a teaspoon of espresso powder. The coffee flavor is very subtle.

One final note, my cookies didn’t sink or spread so much as the cookies photographed in the link. One reason they might have been a little fatter is that I was short on bittersweet chocolate and had to swap in a couple of ounces of Ghirardelli bittersweet chips. Cookies made with melted chips seem to come out fatter than those made with melted chocolate, so even thought I used only a couple of ounces of chips, I suspect it was the chips that cause the cookies to be kind of fat.

I

Double Chocolate Cookies

12 ounces bittersweet chocolate, cut into larger than chip size chunks (I used 70%)
4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped (114 grams)
1/2 cup all-purpose flour (65 grams)
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 large eggs, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1 teaspoon instant espresso powder or 1 tablespoon instant coffee crystals
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 stick (4 ounces) unsalted butter (114 grams), melted

Divide the bittersweet chocolate in half and set half aside. Place the remaining (6 oz) bittersweet chocolate, and the unsweetened chocolate in the top of a double boiler over, but not touching, simmering water. Heat the mixture, stirring occasionally, until the chocolates are melted and smooth. Remove from the heat

Mix the flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl and set aside until needed.

Put the eggs, sugar, coffee and vanilla in the bowl of a mixer fitted with the whisk attachment and beat at high speed for about 10 minutes, until the mixture is very thick and forms a slowly dissolving ribbon when the whisk is lifted and the mixture is allowed to drizzle back into the bowl.

Very gradually add the warm chocolate. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and work rubber spatula around the bottom of the bowl, then continue to mix just until the chocolate is incorporated. Add the melted butter. Add the dry ingredients and mix gently but thoroughly, then stir in the remaining chocolate chunks. The mixture will look like a thick, marshmallowy cake batter.

Cover the bowl with plastic and chill for several hours, or overnight (I chilled the dough for an hour). The dough can be made ahead and kept refrigerated for up to 4 days.

Baking the cookies: When you are ready to bake, position the racks to divide the oven into thirds and preheat the oven to 350˚F. Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper.
Using a heaping tablespoon of dough for each cookie, drop the dough onto the lined sheets, leaving at least 2 inches of space between each mound of dough. Bake the cookies for 10 to 12 minutes, rotating the pans front to back and top to bottom halfway through the baking period. The cookies will puff, then sink and crinkle and wrinkle around the edges (mine didn’t sink much). These cookies are better underdone than overbaked, so if you have any doubts, pull them out of the oven earlier rather than later. These shouldn’t appear dry and they won’t be crisp. Use a wide metal spatula to transfer the cookies to cooling racks to cool to room temperature. Repeat with the remaining dough.

Makes about 3 dozen