Last week, as I was going through my "The Best Chocolate Chip Cookie" board on Pinterest, I kept finding myself looking at Jacques Torres Chocolate Chip Cookies. They looked delicious but they use two different types of flour, cake flour and bread flour. I knew I didn't have any in the house so I kept thinking that I wanted to find something easy, you know, I already have all the ingredients.
Then last Thursday, I received a tweet from Force 4 Photography that said,
@FriendsFoodFam So far, the best chocolate chip cookie I've sampled (and there have been many) is the NYTimes recipe: http://tinyurl.com/6ley7h
I met Russ Jennings and Kevin Ham, of Force 4 Photography, at a presentation they gave for the MA Small Business Development Center called Maximizing your Company's Presence using Google products and Tools. It was funny, when I opened the cookie link (@Force4Photos) it was the Jacques Torres Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe. OK, this is the second time this recipe had been placed in front of me, someone was telling me to make the cookies. I knew last weekend (Memorial Day) was a perfect time, my kids were home, from Missouri and Philadelphia, and we were having a cookout on Sunday night. Off to the supermarket to get cake and bread flour.
As I was getting the ingredients together, I came across a large chunk of callebaut chocolate and thought this would be perfect for the cookies. I decided to chop to dark chocolate into chunks...and splinters. This would give a nice blended taste. I followed the cookie directions exactly as stated. I decided to use the measured weights as my guide. I did this for two reasons: 1. I wanted to make sure the amounts were exact 2. I very rarely weigh my ingredients and thought this was be a good practice for baking. And, to my surprise, weighing the ingredients was so easy.
After refrigerating the dough for 3 hours I started rolling chocolate chip cookie balls slightly larger than a golf ball. You can make them bigger (with an ice cream scoop) but I wanted to have more than 12 cookies as I had quite a few guests coming and any extras would go back to Missouri and Philadelphia. By making them the size I did, I ended up with almost 30 cookies. I probably would have had more if I wasn't enjoying the cookie dough so much.
The cookies were absolutely delicious and PERFECT. They were crunchy, yet chewy, the flavor was balanced with chocolate chunks and cookie. The best part was the salty sweet flavor. That little bit of salt on the top was heaven! Everybody was raving about them. Our friends didn't just take seconds...they took thirds and I was sending people home with some. Now, that is a cookie worth making.
Buy some cake and bread flour and try this Jacques Torres Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe. My only regret - my son Brian said, "Could you make me a batch of these rather than your regular chocolate chip cookies?" Andria's cookies are my classic chocolate chip cookie recipe, these are the family favorite. I was (cookie) crushed...move over Andria, Jacques is in the house.
Jacques Torres Chocolate Chip Cookies: (Adapted from the New York Times)
2 cups minus 2 tablespoons of cake flour (8.5 ounces)
1-2/3 cups of bread flour (8.5 ounces)
1-1/4 teaspoons of baking soda
1-1/2 teaspoons of baking powder
1-1/2 teaspoons of coarse salt
2-1/2 sticks of unsalted butter (1 1/4 cups)
1-1/4 cups of light brown sugar (10 ounces)
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar (8 ounces)
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
1-1/4 pounds of bittersweet chocolate disks or fèves, at least 60% cacao content
Sea salt
Preparation:
1. In a medium sized bowl, mix the flours, salt, baking powder and baking soda together. Put aside.
NOTE: We actually weighted the flours and sugars. With a recipe that was coming so highly regarded, we wanted to follow the exact directions.
2. In a large bowl, using a mixer fitted with a paddle, cream the butter and sugars together on medium speed until light and fluffy.
3. Add the eggs one at a time incorporating each egg into the mixture. Add the vanilla.
4. On low speed, add the dry ingredients. Once blended, add the chocolate.
NOTE: We used a block of bittersweet chocolate and chopped it into pieces. You can chop the chocolate discs in a coarse fashion if you would like to have size variations in your cookie. It makes for a chocolate swirl effect.
5. Place plastic wrap over the mixture and refrigerate for 3-24 hours.
6. Remove dough from the refrigerator.
7. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
8. Using a cookie (or ice cream) scoop, create balls of dough a bit larger than a golf ball. Place 6 cookies per sheet.
9. Sprinkle cookie balls with a bit of sea salt.
10. Bake for 12-16 minutes or until the cookies begin to look slightly golden.
11. Remove from oven and cool on cookie sheet for 5 minutes and then move to a cookie rack.
12. With the size of cookie we made, we ended up with 24-30 cookies.
Enjoy!
