Cake Batter & Crumbs

Triple Chocolate Cookies - Ellie Krieger

What's better than a chocolate cookie?  A chocolate cookie with three kinds of chocolate in it!

And what's even better than that? A triple chocolate cookie that's even healthier for you!

When I was flipping through Ellie Krieger's book The Food You Crave, I knew I had to make these. I love anything with chocolate in it, and to know that these are a healthy food, made it all the more appealing.

Dark chocolate is actually quite good for you. It's rich in antioxidants (surprisingly 8 times the number found in strawberries!) and has been proven to keep your heart and cardiovascular system running smoothly by lowering blood pressure and cholesterol. This recipe uses both dark and milk chocolate to give a nice sweet and not bitter flavor. Combine that with the whole wheat flour, and you've got a quite a healthy and yummy cookie! Even my snoopy husband who won't touch dark chocolate or whole wheat flour  found these quite tasty.

All things in moderation though. I found myself wanting to eat a bunch of these all at once. That's how good they are!

Triple Chocolate Cookies
The Food You Crave and Online

Makes 2 dozen cookies

1/4 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup canola oil
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup whole-wheat pastry flour
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (not Dutch processed)
1/4 teaspoon salt, optional
1/3 cup dark chocolate (2 ounces) coarsely chopped
1/3 cup milk chocolate (2 ounces) coarsely chopped
2/3 cup chopped pecans, optional
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large bowl, mash together the butter and sugars with a fork until well combined. Add the oil and egg and beat until creamy. Mix in the vanilla.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flours, cocoa powder, and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix well. Stir in the dark chocolate, milk chocolate, and the pecans and mix well. Using a tablespoon, scoop the batter onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 12 minutes. Transfer cookies to a cooling rack to cool.

Nutrition Information
Nutritional Analysis per Cookie	Calories: 108
Total Fat: 6 grams	Saturated Fat: 2.5 grams
Protein: 1 gram	Carbohydrates: 13 grams
Fiber: 1 gram

Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie

Recently I had the opportunity to bake with my teenage cousin Emily. She’s learning about all kinds of new interests and hobbies that she can develop, so I really enjoyed showing her my most favorite hobby – baking! My mom was there helping out too, and it turned out to be a lot of fun. I love baking with my family.

Emily chose this recipe, which calls for a giant cookie baking pan. After making a batch and spreading it out in the pan, we realized that one batch wouldn’t be enough. So, we made a second batch and used around half of it to fit in the pan. One batch might have been enough, but I thought it would make a really thin, crispy cookie bar, and that’s not what we wanted. We used the rest of the second batch to make little cookies that she used to decorate the top.

The cookie really turned out perfectly. It was just the right thickness – around ½ to ¾ inches thick and she loaded the top of it with the classic vanilla buttercream icing I used a while ago for these cupcakes.

Ok, so in actuality I had to force her to stand there so I could take a picture of her and the cookie for my blog... (Darn teenagers!) … but she did a fantastic job and I look forward to baking with her again.

Thanks, Em, for letting me show you my favorite hobby! =)

Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie

Ingredients:

• ½ cup butter
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• ¼ cup packed brown sugar
• 1 egg
• ¾ teaspoon vanilla
• 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• ¼ tsp. baking soda
• ¼ tsp. salt
• ½ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350°F. Spray pan with vegetable pan spray. In a large mixing bowl, cream butter with sugars. Add egg and vanilla and mix well. Stir in flour, baking soda and salt; mix well. Stir in chocolate chips. Spread dough into prepared pan with spatula. Bake 15-20 minutes or until light golden brown. Cool on rack for 5 minutes. Remove from pan. Cool before cutting. Decorate.

Makes 8-10 servings.

The Best Chocolate Chip Cookies Ever

In much the same way I like my brownies, I fancy my cookies crisp around the edges and chewy in the middle. I've been searching and searching for a giant chocolate chip cookie recipe like this. I have to admit there's some silly surge of excitement I get each time I order up one of these giant cookies at one the cafe's near where I work.

Thanks to this recipe at AllRecipes.com, I've finally found my official "go to" chocolate chip cookie recipe for the future. At nearly 2000 positive reviews, how can you go wrong? These made huge, chewy and gooey cookies that are so hard to resist. I ended up doubling the recipe and baked over half of them for now. I'm refrigerating the rest of the dough and will bake them up the morning some of my holiday guests arrive next week. Don't let the yield amount throw you off. These cookies are massive, at 1/4 cup dough each, I could only fit 6 per baking sheet. I'd guess you'd get between double and triple the yield if you were making regular sized cookies, but really who wants regular-sized ones when you can have colossal-sized ones?

Best Big, Fat, Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Yield: 18 Cookies

INGREDIENTS                                                               

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 egg
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

DIRECTIONS                                                

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Grease cookie sheets or line with parchment paper.
2. Sift together the flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.                            
3. In a medium bowl, cream together the melted butter, brown sugar and white sugar until well blended. Beat in the vanilla, egg, and egg yolk until light and creamy. Mix in the sifted ingredients until just blended. Stir in the chocolate chips by hand using a wooden spoon. Drop cookie dough 1/4 cup at a time onto the prepared cookie sheets. Cookies should be about 3 inches apart.
4. Bake for 15 to 17 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the edges are lightly toasted. Cool on baking sheets for a few minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Ice Cream Sandwiches

For the 4th of July, my  husband, Shannon and I went to my parents' house for an outdoor BBQ. They recently setup a new gazebo and outdoor table and chairs, so even though we had on-and-off showers here in the northeast, we were able to enjoy an outdoor cookout under the gazebo roof.

For the party, I decided to bring ice cream sandwiches using this recipe for Thick, Soft, and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies. You can achieve so many different types of chocolate chip cookies, just by altering certain ingredients like the amount of butter or sugar used. For me, the best kinds of these cookies are the big, thick, and chewy ones.

These cookies turned out perfectly, and thanks to the men in the house, I had to keep a close watch as they were cooling, so they didn't keep disappearing from the cookie racks.

Once they were cool, I scooped a fair amount of vanilla ice cream and squished them together. They quickly started to melt, so I had to snap a few pictures before quickly wrapping them in cellophane wrap and putting them into the freezer.


I made these a few days ahead of our party, and they stayed nicely in the freezer. They were a little messy when unwrapping, but I think that was due to my waiting to take pictures of them instead of immediately wrapping and placing in the freezer.

In an attempt to lighten these up a bit, I used Edy's Light Vanilla Ice Cream, since no one in my family can tell a difference between this and the full fat stuff, even my ultra low-fat food snoopy father.

Here's the recipe for the cookies:

Thick, Soft, and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies      

Cooking time: About 7 minutes per pan

      

Prep time: About 10 minutes

      

Makes: About 18 cookies

      

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

      

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

      

1/4 teaspoon salt

      

1/2 cup (1/4 lb.) butter or margarine, at room temperature

      

3/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar

      

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

      

1 large egg

      

1 package (6 oz.) or 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

      

1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional)

      

1. Mix flour, baking soda, and salt.

      

2. Beat butter, sugar, and vanilla with a mixer on medium speed until well blended. Beat in egg, mixing well. Add flour mixture, and beat slowly to incorporate, then beat to blend well. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts.

      

3. Drop batter in 2-tablespoon portions about 2 inches apart on baking sheets.

      

4. Bake in a 400° oven until edges of cookies are brown but an area about 1 inch wide in the center is still pale, 6 to 7 minutes. If using 2 pans in 1 oven, switch positions at half-time.

      

5. Let cookies cool on pan about 5 minutes, then transfer to racks with a spatula. Serve warm or cool. Store airtight up to 8 hours, or freeze for longer storage.

      

Per cookie: 160 cal., 46% (73 cal.) from fat; 1.7 g protein; 8.1 g fat (4.8 g sat.); 22 g carbo.; 124 mg sodium; 26 mg chol.

I hope everyone who celebrated, had a terrific 4th!