In the mood for cookies? It’s been said that the internet doesn’t need another chocolate chip cookie recipe, and I don’t disagree. But I needed one. A thin, crispy yet chewy cookie. Not too sweet, but not health food either. And voila, my contribution to the interwebs: my ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookies.
My Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookies
There are so many different kinds of chocolate chip cookies out there. Thick and chewy. Thin and crispy. Crammed with chocolate. Loaded with nuts and other additions. Salted. Even healthier versions.
My quest was to create a chocolate chip cookie that’s thin and crispy, yet still chewy, with a crinkly top. One that has enough chocolate, but not too much — I don’t want the cookie itself to get lost in the shuffle. And about that cookie … it needs to be buttery and sweet, but not too sweet. After all, the chocolate adds sweetness too. And these days I prefer to use less refined sugars instead of standard white sugar.
Let’s Get Real About Ingredients
I like premium ingredients as much as the next person. But I haven’t forgotten what it’s like to raise a family and keep to a grocery budget. Heck, even as an empty nester I’m still on a budget. I suspect most of you are in the same boat. So I made this recipe using regular supermarket chocolate chips. Decent quality, not the cheap ones that taste plasticky, but not the luxury ones either. Yes, I may splurge and get Ghirardelli chocolate at my favourite specialty shop once in a while, but that’s a special treat. One that comes with the all-too-real danger of eating the rest of the bag while my cookies are in the oven.
And while we’re talking about chocolate chips, although my go-to are the semi-sweet ones I don’t hesitate to use milk chocolate chips. They make my family happy. And if that isn’t what making chocolate chip cookies is all about, I don’t know what is. So just go ahead and use whatever type you prefer. Not that you need my permission for that.
The Silver Palate Standard
One of the Little Misses asked me to make chocolate chip cookies for Christmas dinner dessert a couple of years ago. I obliged, using the Old-Fashioned Chocolate Chip Cookies recipe from one of my favourite cookbooks, The New Basics Cookbook by Julie Rosso and Sheila Lukins of Silver Palate fame. (Those of you who were cookbook fans in the 80s and 90s will know what I mean.) Those cookies came close to my ultimate vision, and I used the recipe as a jumping-off point for my version.
Ultimate and Big
Normally I keep my cookies on the medium to small side (you know, for seconds). With these, I’ve indulged in bigger cookies, with only 16 to a batch. They’re somewhere in the range of 3 to 4 inches in diameter (I don’t attempt to achieve factory-like consistency in my baking).
If I were making them for a big gathering, or for a group of little people, I might make them smaller. One of these is a lot of cookie for a little one, not that anyone’s complained. I haven’t tested baking time for smaller cookies … if you go smaller, just keep an eye on the first batch to determine when they’re done and how long it took.
What’s Your Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookie?
An internet search shows pages of recipes billing themselves as the ultimate, the best, the greatest chocolate chip cookies. I’ve even found some that are fantabulous. I’m going to be a little more modest here, simply naming my recipe “Chocolate Chip Cookies.” Who knows, many of those recipes — and mine — may be just about identical. After all, how many meaningful variations can there be of a chocolate chip cookie?
All that said, this recipe is my ultimate chocolate chip cookie. What’s your idea of yours? It may be different than mine, and that’s okay. But I’m going to go out on a limb and wager that you wouldn’t turn one of mine my down. Or seconds.
Let’s Bake Some Chocolate Chip Cookies!
These are my ultimate chocolate chip cookies: thin, crispy yet still chewy, a restrained generosity of chocolate chips, and not overly sweet. The recipe is an adaptation of the Old-Fashioned Chocolate Chip Cookies in The New Basics Cookbook by Julie Rosso and Sheila Lukins.
The recipe calls for you to rap the baking tray on the counter a few times part way during baking. This encourages the cookies to crinkle and crackle.
To save on clean up, if you’re making the cookies by hand you can mix the cookies in the pan or bowl you used to melt the butter.
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter
- 1 cup + 2 tbsp all-purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- pinch kosher salt
- 1/2 cup granulated golden cane sugar
- 1/4 cup coconut sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup chocolate chips (semi-sweet or milk)
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Pre-heat the oven to 375°F. Line a large baking tray with parchment paper.
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Melt the butter in a medium saucepan on the stove, or in the microwave in a bowl. Set it aside to cool somewhat while you measure out the other ingredients.
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Mix the flour, baking soda and salt in a small bowl and set aside.
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Add the sugars directly to the somewhat cooled melted butter and cream for a few minutes with a whisk, until the sugars start to break down. Add the egg and vanilla and stir in well with the whisk.
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Add the flour mixture and stir in with a spatula. When well blended add the chocolate chips and stir to distribute well.
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Using a small ice cream scoop (holds about 25 ml or 1.5 tbsp) or a tablespoon, place mounds of the dough about 4 inches apart on the prepared baking tray. Bake for 5 minutes, then remove the tray and rap sharply on the counter 3 times. Return to the oven for a further 6 minutes until the cookies are nicely golden brown and crisping around the edges.
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Let the cookies sit on the tray for a couple of minutes, then carefully move them to a cooling rack with a large spatula (you don't want them to bend while they're warm!) to finish cooling.
The baking time of 11 minutes is for one tray of cookies and doesn’t include the time to remove the sheets from the oven and rap them on the counter.
In the Mood for More Cookies?
Here are just a few of my favourite cookies here at Urban Cottage Life: Peanut Butter; Cranberry White Chocolate; and Dark Chocolate Sour Cherry.
First Published 2019 03 14
Republished 2022 11 12
Marlene they look good and yummy and your size is all the same tell me your secret….lol
Thank you, Suzanne. Using an ice cream scoop helps me measure out relatively consistent portions. In this case, I was using somewhat less than a full scoop of dough, so there’s some variation in size (how I stacked them for the photos may make them appear more even than they really are!). I have 4 different sizes of ice cream scoops — they’re great for measuring out muffins and cupcakes too. Oh, and ice cream 🙂