Chocolate chip cookies, like fried chicken, are another of those foods that everyone makes, but are hard to make consistently well. Even when I measure the flour by weight, I don’t think I’ve made the same cookie twice. In 10 years of professional baking, during which time I baked the same recipe again and again, the results consistently differed (perhaps detectable only by someone seeing them daily…but still). Confounded by this unpredictability, I gave up trying to make the perfect cookie and settled for a “good enough” cookie.
So imagine my surprise when my most recent batch turned out to be cosmetically the most perfect cookie I’ve baked. And they taste pretty darn good, too. I can’t claim the recipe is anything innovative or unique. It’s got standard proportions and no fancy techniques, but this time they turned out exactly as I wanted.
I like them a little on the thick side, crisp on the edges and chewy in the middle, with plenty of salty-toffee flavor complementing the chocolate, which should be dark but not overpowering. Nuts are optional in my book, depending on my mood. In the case of the chocolate chip cookie, the classic “Tollhouse” cookie has endured for a reason: it can’t be beat. The photo at the top of the post says it all. They are so perfect — at least to my tastes — that I ate only one.
Chocolate Chip Cookies — a modest batch: about 16 cookies
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, simultaneously toasting about 3/4 c. chopped pecans as it comes to temperature. The pecans will burn quickly so keep an eye on them; mine finished just as the oven reached 350. In the meantime, melt 8 Tbsp (1 stick) of butter. Transfer it to a bowl containing 1 c. brown sugar, stirring to mix. Add 1 tsp vanilla and 1 egg, mixing well. Add 1 1/4 c. all-purpose flour, 1/2 tsp baking soda, and 1/2 tsp salt, mixing just to combine. Chop some good chocolate into irregular chunks, totaling about 1 c. (I used Valrhona 61%.) Add the chocolate and the nuts to the batter. Shape into ping pong-sized balls and bake (on a silpat or parchment-lined, light-colored cookie sheet) until crisp and light brown on the edges, but still a bit soft in the middle, about 10 minutes. (I confess I am guessing about the time here. The important thing is to take them out of the oven before the middle of the cookie is solidly firm.)
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