Chocolatey, Chocolate Chip Cookies

Cookies are a wonderful thing, whether you're young or old, rich or poor a cookie is a great treat for just about any occasion. These days we take cookies for granted, they are everywhere, so what's the big deal? Cookies just so happen to be among the oldest treats in existence, they're just about as old as baking itself.

Cookies come in many forms, shapes, sizes, textures, flavours and classifications. They can be hard, soft, crisp, flaky, round or flat. More commonly we bake drop cookies, where we simply make a not too wet but not too dry dough and drop scoops of it on the cookie sheet and bake away. Some cookies require the aid of your refrigerator to firm the dough after its shaped into a log so it can later be sliced into perfect discs or rolled out to cut out different shapes and characters. You can make molded cookies which require messy hands to make balls of dough which will be pressed flat onto the cookie sheet before baking. For the more adventurous types there are pressed cookies for which you would use a cookie press to extrude the dough into different shapes. You can make cookie bars if you're feeling more indulgent, with a wide variety of different fillings and toppings. Many different types of cookies can even be made into sandwich cookies simply by pressing any filling you like in between two baked cookies. Whatever your favourite is, we can all agree on one thing; everybody has a favourite cookie.

My favourite cookie has to have chocolate somewhere in the mix. It's almost impossible for most of us to say 'no' to chocolate, and there are so many ways for chocolate to dress up an otherwise simple cookie. The most common is a chocolate chip cookie, generally made with brown sugar for that sweet and salty molasses flavour. This recipe takes chocolate chip cookies to a whole new level of indulgence, and if you make them right, you won't even  need to dip them in milk.

For the chocolate you can use whatever you favour. This Recipe has two parts involving chocolate; melting the chocolate for the batter, and chocolate chips to fold into the completed batter. You will need to melt the chocolate first. You can use the chips for the melted chocolate portion of the recipe. If you prefer a chocolate brick, again, whatever your pleasure, I prefer a dark chocolate for that intense chocolate flavour. For the chips i prefer semi-sweet, but that is also totally up to you. Whatever chocolate you choose, keep in mind that the milkier and sweeter the chocolate, the more calories and fat you're adding to your cookies.

For the milk you can of course use whatever you like, I love almond or soy, but you can use any milk there is. If you like to drink it, or put it in your coffee, you can use it in this recipe.

For the flour I always like to use whole wheat flour or never bleached flour. You can pick whatever suits you best, based on diet or preference. Most flour types are safe to use, but all purpose flour will deliver a much puffier cookie. Keep in mind, every flour is different, whichever you choose each time you use this recipe, you will have a slightly different result in size, taste, texture and density.

For the extract you can choose from countless flavours, just pick one you know you will like. You can use vanilla, which is the most common, or be bold and go for almond or mint, whatever you like. You can even flavour cookies with a 1/2 oz of alcohol instead.

Chocolatey, Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe:

Preheat oven to 350°

Dry:
2 cups of choice flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup of  choice chocolate chips (keep separate until needed)

Wet:
1/2 cup butter or margarine
1 cup sugar
1 cup sugar egg
1 tsp choice extract
3/4 cup melted chocolate combined with;
1/4 cup choice milk

To Melt the Chocolate:

• Make a double boiler with a steel bowl and a medium saucepan that fit together (bottom of bowl should just fit inside the opening of the saucepan).
• Pour an inch or two of water into the saucepan and place on medium-low heat so the water just comes to a simmer.
• Place steel bowl on top and add the chocolate to the bowl.
• Stir the chocolate every minute or so with a silicone spatula until the chocolate is completely melted.
• Heat the 1/2 cup of milk in the microwave for about 45 seconds until hot and slowly add to the chocolate, stirring chocolate constantly until blended.
• Remove double boiler from heat, remove steel bowl with chocolate inside and set aside on a dish towel on the counter.

To Mix The Batter

• Combine all dry ingredients in a large bowl and set aside
• In an electric mixer, combine butter or margarine and sugar and cream together on low speed
• Beat in egg, and extract
• Increase speed on mixer to medium and very slowly pour in melted chocolate, constantly mixing the ingredients until combined
• In two additions add the dry ingredients while mixer is on low speed. Once ingredients are just combined, turn off mixer. Mixing a cake batter for too long once flour is added will strengthen the gluten and make a stiff batter, nobody wants that.
• Gently incorporate 1/2 cup of chocolate chips into batter with a rubber or silicone spatula. Once combined set aside in a cooler part of the kitchen. 
• Lightly grease a cookie tray, unless you have a sil-pat or silicone mat which needs no greasing
• Scoop batter with one teaspoon and push onto tray with another teaspoon. Cookies need to be at least one inch appart.
• Bake at 350° for 8-12 minutes, or until bottoms are a light golden brown. Be careful not to bake them until they are hard in the oven or you will not have moist cookies, unless you prefer crisp cookies. 
• Allow baked cookies to cool on a cooling tray if you have one, or a plate, for about 3-5 minutes before devouring. 

I hope you enjoy making these cookies as much as I do, and I hope you enjoy eating them even more!

Recipe Created, Written and Published by: Rachel Gonsalves