Totally Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies

These are the most chocolatey chocolate cookies I've ever made. Small surprise given that they involve melted chocolate, cocoa powder and chocolate chips. The recipe comes from Nigella Lawson's latest book, Nigella Express. And she apparently got it from a book called Big Fat Cookies. If you make these original size they really are big fat cookies, and so rich you will struggle to eat a whole one. I've already made this recipe twice, due to spousal demand, and the second time halved the size to give 24 cookies instead of 12. This is better, I think, and less likely to result in big fat Whites.

I've tried to convert the recipe to dual-nationality units. The strange amount for chocolate chips is because here you get 11 oz packages which say they are 2 cups. so the first time I used a whole one of those. The second time I had a 12 oz package, and just used 4 oz to melt and the remaining 8 oz unmelted. It still seemed like plenty. In the UK choc chips come in teeny tiny packages and you may balk at buying four for just one recipe, so just throw in as many as looks right to you.

4 oz / 1 stick soft butter

1/2 cup / 4 oz light brown sugar

1/4 cup / 2 oz granulated sugar

4 oz dark / semisweet chocolate, melted

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 egg, cold from the fridge

1 cup / 5 oz plain flour

1/4 cup / 1 oz cocoa powder

1 tsp baking soda / bicarb of soda

1/2 tsp salt

2 cups / 8-11 oz dark choc chips

Preheat oven to 325F / 160C.

Cream butter and sugars in a mixing bowl.

Add melted chocolate and mix in. Beat in vanilla and egg.

Mix in flour, cocoa, soda and salt. Stir in chocolate chips.

Scoop out 1/4 cup (4 tbsp) mounds for large cookies, placing 2 1/2 inches apart on baking sheets. Or use 2 tbsp amounts for medium cookies. This should give you 12 and 24 respectively, if it's easier just to divide the mixture into the right number of cookies.

Bake 18 min for the large cookies or 12-15 min for the medium ones.

Cool on baking sheet for 4-5 min, then move to a rack.

Comments

I have a piano!!!

OK, maybe we should have bought a stand! But who cares if it doesn't have the most aesthetically pleasing setting - it's great to have something to play on again. My most loving and wonderful husband had obviously picked up a few signs that I was missing my piano (no, I wasn't hinting that badly!) and a few days ago said, "I was just in the guitar shop and they had a big sale on keyboards - do you want to take a look?" So we went and browsed around a bit, and he firmly dragged me away from the $1000+ models and made me look at some more reasonable ones, and after some discussion we went for this little Casio. It's more portable than the type with a built-in stand, which was a big consideration when we know we're moving in less than 2 years and I had to leave my old one behind for precisely that reason. It's got weighted keys so the touch is good; the sound could be better but it renders Bach quite prettily even if not really coping with Rachm...

Working on sunshine

Freeeee electricity! No, seriously. This guy came and knocked on the door one day, and I don't usually pay any more attention to random strangers trying to sell me something at the door than you probably do, but I guess he must have said "free" enough times to penetrate my consciousness, so I found myself agreeing to have someone check our house's suitability for solar panels. And another guy turned up, and measured; and another one, and we signed; and a few more, and put up scaffolding and panels and meter boxes and cable; and suddenly, if we're careful, we can avoid paying for any electricity during daylight hours, because it's all generated right up there above our heads. Of course, we have the British government to thank for this, which probably means we're paying for it somewhere along the line. The Department for Energy and Climate Change (presumably it's actually against climate change rather than for it, although you never know) has...

It isn't that important to me...

When we went sailing a few weeks ago, I mentioned to one of the club members that I had tried sailing a topper as a teenager, and really enjoyed it. He asked: "Why haven't you done any sailing since then?" Well. On the face of it, that's a perfectly reasonable question. On the other hand, why don't we do all these many things that we would probably enjoy if we did them? Because our weekends are already full. Because we don't know anyone else who does it. Because it will cost money. Because we're afraid it will take up all our time. Because the kids don't want to. Because, quite frankly, it isn't that important to us. Which isn't really something you can say to someone who's been sailing for longer than you've been alive. But that's pretty much what it comes down to. That brief conversation, and a similar one with a tennis instructor, served to point out the difference between those who are "in" an ...

Martha's Marvellous Munchies

Search This Blog