This weekend I made a batch of (one of) my favorite chocolate chip cookies recipes. They were delicious, but I started thinking of ways I could make them even better and decided to try the recipe with some minor changes. Results were excellent! In fact, these "Stand Mixer Chocolate Chunk Cookies" reminded me of the famous Jacques Torres cookies. They are packed with chocolate, but still reasonably thick. Here's the photo and new recipe. I put all my notes and changes below.
Ultimate Stand Mixer Chocolate Chunk Cookies
2 ½ cups unbleached all purpose flour (320 to 350 grams) -- see note about measuring
¾ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
8 oz unsalted butter, cold, cut into pieces (230 grams)
1 cup very firmly packed light brown sugar (240 grams)
¾ cup granulated sugar (144 grams)
2 large eggs, room temperature (100 grams)
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup nuts, chopped and toasted (I use either walnuts or pecans)
14-15 oz chopped, good quality chocolate
Stir together the flour, baking soda and salt; set side.
Beat cold butter until creamy in bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Add both sugars and continue for 4-5 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating for a full minute after each egg and another minute or two after both eggs have been added. Beat in the vanilla.
With mixer on lowest speed or by hand (I always do this part by hand), add dry ingredients. When incorporated, add chocolate chips and nuts and stir to mix. Dump the dough out onto a sheet of waxed paper, wrap it tightly and chill for 24 hours or as long as you can wait or shape the dough into golf ball size balls and chill the ready-formed balls of dough.
Arrange cookie balls on ungreased cookie sheets spacing about 3 inches apart. Flatten a little to resemble a hockey puck, about ¾inch high.
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Bake at 350 degrees F for 12-15 minutes (check at 10, depending on size scoops you actually used). Edges should be golden brown. Let sit at room temperature 5 minutes before taking off baking pan.
Makes about 32 cookies
Note: I've made these a couple of times and each time the cookies were a different thickness. To nail down what was going on, I varied the amount of flour by 30 grams. Cookies made with 320 grams of flour were quite a bit thinner than the 350 gram measure. Because 2 ½ cups of flour can have a different weight every time, I'm keeping that measure the same. But if don't have a scale and your cookies are coming out thinner than you'd like, try adding 3 tablespoons of flour.
More note on where this recipe came from
---First, the old recipe called for the unusual step of adding the eggs in little spoonfuls at a time. Using that method made a great cookie, but I wanted to see what would happen if I just added the eggs the usual way and beat them for a while
---The old recipe called for 1 ¼ teaspoons baking soda which seemed like a lot. I cut it down to ¾ teaspoons just to see what would happen.
---The old recipe called for 3 cups of chocolate chips. Because this dough has a pretty high ratio of flour to butter, I thought perhaps it could accommodate a higher quality, higher cocoa fat chocolate. I like good chocolate as much as the next person, but a lot of times I’ll put it in cookies and the extra fat will cause the cookies to spread more than they would have with regular chocolate chips. With this dough, it seemed like I could use a ton of good chocolate and not worry about the spreading.
---And finally, rather than bake the cookies at 400, I baked the cookies at the usual temperature of 350.
According to the (late) author of the original recipe, the cookies are better after the dough has chilled for 24 hours. I believe that to be true, but the cookies I baked after a couple of hours of chilling were delicious. Now I need to go buy some really good chocolate to put in the next batch.
Oh, one more thing. You can make these without a stand mixer, but the recipe involves beating cold butter and a lot of creaming, so a stand mixer really comes in handy and I needed a good name for the recipe.
Marcee says
Making these pic-perfect ccc t'nite ..... like now!
Can I subscribe to CookieMadness via email? Would be terrific!
Thanks. HNY!
craig says
What is the best stand mixer for PB eggs mixure? maye 10 to 20 qt? Wht brand? email to [email protected]
Elena says
I made these Thursday & Friday. The Thursday cookies, with only a couple of hours in the fridge were ok, chewy and fat. The Friday cookies had a bit of a crispy top but still fat and chewy, which I liked a lot. The only problem is having to think far ahead with my baking, which I don't usually do! Thanks for the recipe and notes!
Anna says
Brooke, thanks for the update! I've made these a few times and they're always good. My flatter ones (which were not as unattractively flat, just not as thick as the photo) were due to my not using enough flour.
brooke says
anna, these were an instant hit at our NFL draft party. the perfect height. crispy edges and chocolatey, gooey inside. thanks 🙂
Carrie says
thanks, anna! everyone still loved (and ate!) them.
Anna says
I made another batch of these day and tried adding a litte more (30 grams) of flour. The cookies with the added flour were a little thicker -- more like the ones in the picture, so I must have used a heavier hand then I though when I made those cookies. So the cookies will be good if you use 320 grams of flour, but thinner. For thicker cookies, use 350 grams.
Anna says
Lisa, I think that's because you cut out a significant amount of sugar and sugar makes cookies spread. So my options for making these thicker are adding a little bit of flour or using slightly less sugar. I really packed the brown sugar, so packing it a bit less would probably help the cookies stay tall. I have some construction workers to feed today, so maybe I'll make two half batches and see what works best -- adding 15 grams of flour to the half batch or packing the brown sugar less firmly.
Lisa Ernst says
Anna, I didn't mention how my cookies came out in terms of height, but actually they were perfect. They didn't flatten out at all. I did refrigerate the dough for 24 hours, and made them bigger and thicker -- 10 instead of 16 for a half batch (I didn't flatten at all before baking). Don't know if that matters or not. I will definitely make these again.
Anna says
Carrie, I've made a few batches since this one and noticed some of the batches were coming out thinner than the ones pictured. In some cases, I used chocolate chips and in some, I left out the nuts. I'm going to try to pin-point the issue (it's not really a problem since the cookies are still good!) to see if I can get consistently good results. Maybe adding the egg in tiny bits, as instructed in the original, is a more important step. Or maybe it's just a matter of adding a couple of tablespoons more flour. I'm going to try that today.
Carrie says
Hi Anna,
I made these today and they came out flat as can be. Trying to figure out what I did incorrectly. They are still tasty, but not what they should be. What could I have done wrong? I followed the directions exactly.
Thanks,
Carrie
Lisa Ernst says
Well, I had these cookies after my ride this a.m. and they are outstanding! I altered the recipe a little -- used maybe 1/3 white wheat flour in place of regular, cut the sugar down also by maybe 1/3 and substituted stevia and lo han sweetener. Also, I made the cookies bigger. For a half recipe, I got 10 cookies instead of 16. I like a lot of cookie. Next to the NY Times cookies recipe, I think this one is my favorite. Thanks!
Julie says
That's the best picture of CCCs I've seen in a long time! I had bookmarked the older version, but it's nice that you simplified the technique a bit.
Anna says
Sure! I used dark chocolate so I put "dark chocolate" in the ingredient list. Feel free to use whatever type of chocolate you want. I think a mixture of dark or semi-sweet and milk might even be good.
eleventh.st says
Would it be ok to sub semi-sweet chocolate with milk chocolate? I always find the semi-sweet too be bitter, but I worry that the milk chocolate would make the cookie too sweet
Cookie Sleuth says
I have a new stand mixer coming, and these will be the first cookies I make with it!
melissa says
Those cookies look great! Thanks for posting. Interesting to hear your take on which chocolates you use to bake for what occasions. Our store around the corner always has Guittard and Ghiradelli so that's what I use too and it's not going to break the bank. Valhrona and Scharffen Berger are more expensive and I have to walk to a farther away store to find them, so yeah, only for very special, special occasions...
Katrina says
Louise, we're moving to Utah in June. I"ll have to see what wonderful chocolate choices are there!
Ram-COLD out of fridge.
Anna--The dough is a-chillin'. But it's only been a few hours and that's probably all I'm going to wait. I "need" these cookies now. No really, I'm making them for someone else and need to make them, can't wait the 24 hours. But I will save some of the dough to try in the morning.
Ram says
When you said cold butter, cold right from the refrigerator which is still hard or somewhat cold and softened a little bit? Thanks.
JoanS says
Something worked!! Now I can read you in IE again!! Thank you!!
cookienurse says
Like you I based my chocolate chip choices on who would appreciate the special chips the most.
The cookie is beautiful!~
Sweets By Vicky says
I think I died and went to chocolate chip cookie heaven. I hate cookies with a measly amount of chocolate. Pile it on!
Louise says
Katrina -- Hershey bought Scharffen Berger in 2005 so they should "bring it" to Kansas. I live in eastern Pennsylvania and we don't have Guittard anything or Valrhona.
Julie says
These look divine! If I waited 24 hrs for cookie dough to chill, the dough would be gone!
Cheryl Cormier says
That is a phenomenal amount of chocolate - they look great!
Katrina says
You know, here in this lil' ol' Kansas town, I've never seen Valhrona, Scharfen Berger of any kind, or Guittard bars (only chips). The natural foods store has things like Dagoba, and such, but I'm kinda bummed sometimes to not find better stuff. But lucky for me, Walmart has Lindt and a month ago, Target had Ghirardelli chips on sale for $1.79 a bag and I stocked up like crazy, like 12 bags or so! I thought I really only liked the "cheap" semi sweet stuff, but now I can hardly stand it. Spoiled, spoiled me.! 😉
Rina says
Yum! This recipe looks like a better option than the Jaques Torres recipe because I never seem to have bread flour lying around and I love that particular recipe (and this style of ccc). Thanks Anna! Also, on a side note, I finally remembered which black bottom cupcake recipe I had tried years ago (that sank): http://leitesculinaria.com/2312/recipes-chocolate-cream-cheese-cupcakes.html.
Louise says
I, too, am guilty of adding the eggs one at a time and then beating them extra. I also bake the cookies at 350 degrees, but always chill them overnight as I do with a lot of cookies. The creator, the late W. Richard Stevens of UNIX and TCP/IP fame, prefaced his recipe with "The trick to this recipe is the technique. If you don't use a heavy duty mixer (to cream the butter, sugar, and eggs, as directed) and don't let the cookie dough rest in the refrigerator overnight, these are just regular chocolate chip cookies." His favorite chips were Guittard. So beware. 🙂
clumbsycookie says
I wanna print that picture on edible paper and eat it!!!!!! Thanks Anna, one more to add to the "ccc to-try list". But since you are the Queen (as Katrina said) of cccs and if you say those are the ultimate, I'll have to move them to the first position on the list!
Lisa Ernst says
Anna, these cookies look 100% perfect for my taste! Loads of chips, a thick substantial cookie, and well, perfect. I'm doing a 25 mile charity bike ride on Saturday (plenty hilly) and I want a treat when I'm done. I can mix and chill the dough on Friday and bake on Saturday. Great timing.
Anna says
My idea of good chocolate is the best you can afford at the time. I bake a lot (it's true!) and use Ghirardelli and Guittard quite often. If I'm splurging and want to impress someone, I'll use Scharffen Berger. If I'm going to try to really impress someone who'd appreciate it, I'll use Valrhona. It depends on the situation and who I'm making the cookies for. These are for a construction crew and I don't know the guys well so I'll probably use Ghirardelli.
Kelly, that is so cool!!! You really went all out. I'm going to take my time reading your post.
Katrina, I really like Lindt too. In fact, I might go buy some since you mentioned it.
Krystle, it's good to know I'm not boring everyone with the yellow cake. I will probably try Shirley C.'s recipe tomorrow.
Krystle says
seriously I was dying over all of your yellow cake discussions but these make me want about 5 and a large glass of milk! Yum
Katrina says
Sarah, just adding my boring little 2 cents worth, but my current favorite good, but affordable chocolate is Ghirardelli 60% cacao chips. I almost can't even eat the old stand bys anymore, especially in a ccc. They are often on sale at grocery store.s They are flatter like disks, too. But I actually also like splurging on good bars, which are like Lindt Extreme Dark 70%. But there lots out there to choose from. And now, I'd like to turn the time back over to the Queen of.....Anna! 😉
And THOSE, Anna, look like the kind of ccc I like! You know I'll try them. I can't remember if I tried them back when you posted them, but I do remember that name. And boy, yellow cakes, applesauce cakes and all kinds of cookies all during the weekend. Whew! Won't you be my neighbor?!
Kelly says
After your Top 5 favorite recipe post I made 5 of the cookie doughs you highlighted (and that I hadn't made before). This recipe was definitely one of my favorites and I look forward to trying the new version. In a second round of baking I found that the cookies spread a great deal if just refrigerated - only by refrigerating them for 24+ hours and then freezing them over night, did they hold their shape.
If anyone is interested, here are my results:
Dough assessment:
http://kellysirishred.blogspot.com/2010/03/dough.html
Final cookie taste-test:
http://kellysirishred.blogspot.com/2010/03/cookie-results.html
Sue says
They look really excellent!! I'm so glad your tweaks to that recipe yielded such fantastic results.
Sarah says
Oh my gosh these look great. What is your (or anyone else's) opinion of "good chocolate"? I would like to make sure I buy it!
Barbara says
Your newest version of cc cookies actually looks layered with chocolate. These really look great, Anna.
Bev says
My husband would love these! I can never put enough chocolate chips in his cookies. 🙂
Veronica says
What brand/type of Chocolate did you use?
Joan says
The cookies look fabulous! I think I gained weight just looking at them. Thanks for sharing the recipe!