The Best Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Who doesn't love a warm chocolate chip cookie right out of the oven? Mmm, there's almost nothing better (except maybe the cookie dough). Just when I think I've got all the chocolate chip cookie recipes I'll ever need, I try a new one that goes in the recipe box.

I was craving chocolate chip cookies like MAD the other day and for some reason wanted to try a new recipe.  Although I absolutely love my current go-to Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies and these Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies (my hubby's favorite), there was just something about this recipe that drew me to it.  I had to try it!  The method is similar to the brown butter CCCs and hey, the recipe is from Joy the Baker, so I knew I couldn't go wrong there. 

I've learned a few things over the years from baking many, many, MANY batches of cookies. So if you find a recipe with similar methods, you're sure to have a winner.

1-Whip it, whip it real good!!!  When you cream the sugar and butter, don't just beat until it's combined, beat it for a good 3-4 minutes until it's light and fluffy.  It spreads out the sugar granules and incorporates air into the dough resulting in a more tender cookie.

2-Use a combination of both white and brown sugars.  I learned this a long time ago from Alton Brown on "Good Eats."  All white sugar will make a crispy cookie that spreads more, while adding brown sugar helps add a little moisture as well as chewiness.

3-Chill!  You don't have to chill the dough very long (20 minutes) but chilling the dough will help the cookies from spreading too quickly.

4-Low and slow.  Don't be tempted to turn up the heat! Use a gentle heat (350 degrees) and slightly underbake and you'll have a soft, moist and chewy cookie.

5-Use a chocolate bar instead of chocolate chips.  Chocolate chips have stabilizers that keep them from melting as easily as a chocolate bar.  Plus by chopping up a bar of chocolate, you not only get chunks of chocolate but little shards throughout the whole cookie, thus chocolate in every bite.


The Best Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
1 cup butter (2 sticks), room temperature
1 cup brown sugar, packed
2 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. molasses
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
2 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 cup semi-sweet or dark chocolate, chopped
1 cup pecans, roughly chopped
1/2 cup sweetened, flaked coconut, toasted

Place 1 of the sticks of butter in a small saucepan.  Melt the butter over medium heat, swirling the pan occasionally.  Once it's melted, it'll start foaming then it'll start popping. Keep a close eye on it, continuing to swirl.  Once the butter starts smelling nutty and the brown bits on the bottom turn amber in color, remove it from the heat.  Allow to cool completely.

In the mean time spread the coconut out on a cookie sheet and place under the broiler until just starting to brown.  Don't take your eye off it.  It can go from toasted to completely burned in a matter of seconds!  Remove from oven and set aside to cool.

In a stand mixer, fitted with a paddle attachment, cream the remaining stick of butter with the brown sugar about 3-4 minutes, stopping to scrape the sides as necessary.  Mix in the vanilla and molasses.

Add the cooled browned butter and the granulated sugar and cream another 2 minutes until light and fluffy.  Add egg and egg yolk one at a time and mix.  Add in flour, baking soda and salt and mix until mixture it uniform.  Gently fold in chopped chocolate, toasted coconut and pecans.

Scrape the dough out onto plastic wrap and flatten into a disc.  Refrigerate about 20-30 minutes.  Alternately, you can scoop out all the dough into balls ahead of time, then refrigerate the balls. 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Once dough is chilled, scoop dough out onto cookie sheets, either using a small cookie scoop or making about 2-inch balls.  Place 9 balls per cookie sheet.  Bake 12-15 minutes, until tops just start to get golden.  Remove from oven, cool a minute or two on the cookie sheet the cool completely on a wire rack.



SOURCE: Joy The Baker