Friday, November 18, 2011

Butterscotch chocolate chip cookies (Modern Baker)


Oh, you have no idea how excited I am to start this section! Cookies are technically supposed to be our last section of the Modern Baker Challenge, but knowing how many cookies people generally bake at this time of year, our brilliant leaders/members decided to flip-flop the final two sections. Looking at the list of possibilities, I positively could not commit to which recipes to pick; they all sound and look so good!

My first choice would probably have been these butterscotch chocolate chip cookies, but they'd already been taken.......But wait! Just because I'm not the official blogger doesn't mean I can't try them, right? Right! :)

I made these to bring to my debate class to thank them for their hard work hosting a middle school debate tournament last week.

I was surprised by the technique. You start by mixing softened butter, brown sugar, vanilla, and eggs in a stand mixer, just until blended. Usually you cream these ingredients for quite a while, but NM warns against over-mixing, so I really just mixed them until they all came together. Then you gently fold in the flour mixture (flour, salt, and baking soda) with a rubber spatula. I was worried that it wouldn't all come together; it just seemed impossible to get all of the flour incorporated. But with patience, it worked and I had smooth cookie dough with no extra flour. Then I folded in a lot of chocolate. NM calls for 6 ounces of chopped bittersweet chocolate and 6 ounces of chopped milk chocolate. I had a 4 ounce bar of bittersweet, so I used that. And then about 6 ounces of semi-sweet chocolate chunks. Even missing 2 ounces of chocolate, I felt like this batter was more chocolate than cookie.

The cookies are placed in teaspoon-sized rounds on the cookie sheets. NM says to cook two trays for 15 minutes, rotating the trays halfway. By 12 minutes, both of my trays were burned. I'm not sure if they were really supposed to be tablespoon-sized? Or if 15 minutes is just way too long? NM's baking times are usually pretty accurate for my oven. I experimented and ended up finding that 10 minutes, baking one tray at a time, seemed about perfect. I was able to get about two trays of good cookies. (I figured high schoolers would eat the burned ones anyway!) So be sure to watch these carefully!!

As for the flavor...they are definitely butterscotchy/toffee-y in flavor and texture and very chocolatey. These are quite different from our normal more traditional chocolate chip cookie recipe, and quite addictive. The containers of cookies (the "good" ones as well as the slightly-overdone ones) lasted all of about 30 seconds in class....and one of my kids asked me to make them again for Monday. :)

6 comments:

  1. I think several of us have started this section early. I made brownies and caramel crumb bars last weekend. They were both amazing! Your scotchies look really delicious. I can't wai to try this recipe.

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  2. These sound wonderful. The more chocolate the better! I'm excited about the cookie section too, but I wish NM wouldn't say that the cookies only keep like 1 or 2 days, cause hubby and I can't consume them that quickly. I need to find avenue's to distribute some of these baked goods.
    Just keep bakin' the kids cookies and they'll love you:)

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  3. Ooh, ooh, make a double batch for Monday and leave a few at Wild Rumpus Daycare, 'kay?

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  4. Those look delicious. And they look like the perfect cookie to use as a substitution for Tate's Bakeshop Cookies. Nice and flat and crispy. I'm so glad you posted this one - I would have never made the connection if I hadn't seen your picture. (I can't get Tate's cookies here and I want to make Ina's Ice Box Cake recipe that calls for them!) I'm super excited to try these now!

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  5. We loved these too! I also found the mixing instructions interesting and was thrilled my cookies were well risen and not flat as promised. I must admit, I don't think I paid any attention to the baking time. I always bake my choc chip cookies for 8-10 min and I think I did the same on these. 15 seems long!

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  6. Those look very nice, my guys are going to love cookie section. Question is: am I going to post anything from puff pastry section before the end of the month? Too early to tell. Maybe. lol You did such a good job with it all!

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