Ahh yes, the famous choc-chip cookie, perfect with an ice cold glass of fresh milk. Ruth Wakefield, owner of the Toll House Inn in Massachusetts, is credited with inventing the world renowned chocolate chip cookie. Apparently one day she decided to cut up a Nestle chocolate bar and add it to her butter cookie recipe. They were a hit, Nestle caught on and so was the birth of the famous Nestle Toll house cookie. Reported to be the Americans fav cookie, Ruth Wakefield's recipe set off hundreds of bakers across the globe creating their own variations. Back in 1987 Chester Soling, owner of an Inn in Massachusetts, decided to sponsor a nationwide contest to find THE best chocolate chip cookie recipe. Over 2,600 entries were received and the 100 best recipes were compiled in a book called "The Search for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie" by Gwen Steege. Thats alot of baking and alot of cookie eating, it would not surprise me if the last 400 recipes they tested were the worst. You would be so put off after eating 2100 other lots that it would be the last thing you'd want to be eating let alone there being any chance of you liking it, liking it even more than cookie one thousand seven hundred and fifty four, but i guess he would of had employees for that and thats why I have my family!And as if my family hasn't had to deal with downing enough of my own batches of these calorific cant-stop at one morsels (although probably not quite two thousand), I go ahead and bake up another batch. And so off i set and boy George am i glad i did. This is definitely a worthy recipe, close to the best i could imagine a double chocolate chip cookie could be. I borrowed the recipe from Stephanie Alexanders the cooks bible and after one mouthful, i could see why she says everyone loves them.
They were like brownies in a biscuit, the kind of cookie where a glass of cold milk is vital to wash them down. Boy they were good, and i speak in past tense because although it has not been 24hours since i baked them, the entire batch is gone. And i thought you were sick of chocolate chip cookies, I remark with a sly grin to my family.
I used Cadbury Dream chocolate for the choc bits because after batches and batches of cooking, i have definitely learnt one thing, quality over quantity. The cookies will always taste so much better if you use a block of eating chocolate rather than cooking, trust me. Stephanie's recipe was for straight out choc-chip cookies, but i am a little chocolate piggy so i always go for adding cocoa into the mix. And i must say, i feel like sending Mrs Alexander a letter, an sms even, although she doesn't quiet strike me as the kind of woman who would own a mobile phone to tell you the truth, more a traditional "hello operator" style wall phone. Anyway, i think she ought to know the wonders the added cocoa did to these little chunks of chocolate goodness.
However, my search does continue for that chewy cookie, waiting for me out there in the yonder... but if you want to give these baby's a go:
Ingredients:
125g plain flour
1/2tsp salt
1/2tsp bi-carb soda
120g roasted nuts eg. almonds, macadamias, hazelnuts, walnuts (optional)
170g hunk of a block of chocolate, white milk or dark
110g softened butter
1/3cup Castor sugar
1/3cup raw sugar
1 egg
approx 1/4cup cocoa (if you want them to be chocolate bikkies)
Method:
Sift flour, salt, cocoa and bi-carb into a large bowl. Add nuts and chopped up chocolate into chunks. In an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Add egg, then fold in the chocolate flour mix. It will appear to be extremely too dry and you'll be tempted to add water, but don't! persevere, keep mixing and eventually amazingly it will all come together and actually be very very gooey, it takes about five minutes. Form the mixture into two fat logs and wrap tightly in cling wrap. Chill for one hour before baking.
Preheat oven to 175 degrees and line a baking tray with paper. Unwrap logs and cut into thick slices. Place on baking tray, allowing room to spread and bake for 12minutes exactly. Cool on a wire rack. eat up!
