Making The Best Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe - Part 4
We have finally made it to part 4- BAKING.
Part 1 was about weighing your flour, dry to fat ingredient ratios, butter, and sugar.
Part 2 was about baking powder vs. baking soda, flour & texture, and salt.
Part 3 was about eggs, vanilla, add-ins, and chilling.
This section will focus on baking, cooling, and storing! You’re almost there and will soon become a certified cookie scientist.
What size should you make your cookie dough ball?
This is going to come down to preference and thinking about spread. The larger your cookie, the less it will spread than if you made it smaller. This just has to do with how much energy is required to flatten out that cookie.
I have played with 35 gram dough balls, 65 gram dough balls, and 100 gram dough balls. 35 grams is great if you like small grocery store sized cookies. I feel like the 65 gram dough ball is the perfect size where it requires a few bites and you still can achieve a nice golden crunchy outside with a chewy interior. Finally, if you want a ginormous dessert to laugh about, give the 100 gram dough ball a go. They are obnoxious and one cookie is plenty. This is great for a gooey undercooked interior and a nice crispy outside since they require a longer baking time.
You’re going to need to experiment with this and see what you prefer! In general, this is what I have found using three different weights for cookies.
What temp should I bake my cookies at and for how long?
Bake time will be affected by the size of your cookie dough, but these times will be based off my experience with a 65 gram cookie dough ball.
If you want to achieve an all around even bake, try baking at 325 degrees for 13-16 minutes. This will allow the interior cookie to bake at a similar pace as the exterior.
The standard cookie is baked at 350 degrees. This will give you a chewy interior and a golden crunchy exterior. My personal favorite.
If you are looking for a whole different beast of a cookie, try 375 or 400 degrees. This will bake the outside much quicker than the inside and give you a very dark crunchy exterior and an under baked gooey interior. Christina Tosi does this with some of her cookies and it is an interesting approach to cookies.
My word of advice for both of these sections is try and keep the size of the dough balls close in size. You don’t want some cookies to be overdone and some underdone because they are baking at different rates. Either weigh them or use a spoon and eyeball it. If you want to be a kitchen scientist, I highly recommend adding a kitchen scale to your arsenal!
The most critical step- cooling and storing.
People tend to skip on this step and ruin all of their hard work by not cooling properly. Let your cookies sit on the sheet for at least 5 minutes. No more than 10 minutes! This is when carryover cooking happens. Yes, your precious cookies are out of the oven, but they continue cooking for a few minutes on the hot pan. If you notice you left your cookies in for too long, skip this cooling step and immediately transfer to a wire rack. You will help stop the baking process quicker.
If you want to make sure your cookies don’t get soggy while they cool, you need a cooling rack. This allows air to flow under the cookies and excess moisture to escape. I always try to bake in the morning or early afternoon so they completely cool all the way through. You don’t want to bake and throw cookies into your storage container of choice too quickly. Thats when your cookies get soggy right off the bat :(. No one wants that, just be patient!
Finally, make sure you store your cookies in an airtight container. A ziplock or Tupperware will work nicely. I have tried the bread trick to prevent moisture buildup in the container, but I found that the cookies took on some of the bread flavor. Cookies never last more than 2-3 days in my house. Thats because I only bake 5-10 cookies at a time and store the rest in the freezer. I’m always willing to wait a few minutes for oven fresh cookies.
BONUS dessert everyone can make.
Take your warm cookies and smash any flavor of ice cream you desire in between two cookies to make an ice cream cookie sandwich. This will work nicely with any type of cookie, but a thin and crispy will hold up better against the ice cream since it is much sturdier.
You made it! That is the end of cookie lab, and by now you should be able to craft your perfect cookie. It is easier to figure out your ideal cookie when you know every variable that effects the outcome. This requires a lot of experimenting, but hopefully I have helped you avoid some mistakes and bumps in the road with my hacks.