Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Kick-Ass Cookies

Warning: Completely self-indulgent, horn-tooting, post.

Kyle loves chocolate chip cookies. Given a choice when I'm in the mood for baking, he always goes with chocolate chip. I had just made a small batch a week or so earlier, so a few nights ago when we were planning on leftovers for dinner and I decided to bake, I thought I'd make something different.

I was flipping through my Cook's Illustrated book, "Baking Illustrated" and came across pecan bars. Hmm... tasty...

"Ooo, are you making cookies?" Kyle wanted to know.

"Well, I was thinking of making pecan bars..."

His face falls, ever so slightly.

"But I can make cookies."

"Yay!" His face lights back up.

So I found a recipe for "Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies." As the book says, the goal is to recreate those huge, sinfully rich cookies you find in boutique bakeries and fancy hotels.

And damn if they weren't just as good - if not better!

Not only were they delicious, but they actually looked good too. I think the secret to that was size consistency (you portion out a "scant" quarter-cup of dough per cookie) and the strange technique of pulling the dough ball apart and squishing the two "broken" halves together, "broken" side up - this makes for a craggy top.

I was so pleased, I took a photo!



(On my trusty Silpat - a non-stick liner made with silicon and fiberglass. No, really. It's awesome.)

Kyle loves them. I took a few to work today (the recipe only makes 18, and they are for Kyle, so I split them in half) and my coworkers really liked them as well.

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