I've been making mint chocolate chip cookies regularly for many years -- ever since my former boss at the Department of Justice shared Mollie Katzen's recipe for Chocolate Chip-Mint Cookies from Still Life with Menu Cookbook with me. I love Katzen's recipe and have never felt the need to try another one. But this week's Baked Sunday Mornings recipe is Chewy Chocolate Mint Cookies with Chocolate Chunks -- so I curious to see how the recipe would compare to Katzen's.
As I read through the ingredient list, it was a bit unusual for a drop cookie. The recipe doesn't require whole eggs, but an egg white only -- and it includes a large quantity of corn syrup. To make the dough, you cream together softened butter and dark brown sugar, add all of the wet ingredients (corn syrup, egg while, peppermint extract, and vanilla), and then mix in all of the dry ingredients (flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, salt, and chocolate chunks). Then you chill the dough for at least 24 hours (incidentally, I always chill the dough for Katzen's chocolate chip mint cookies even though it's not called for in the recipe -- the final texture always turns out better).
I ended up chilling the dough for 48 hours before baking. The dough was oddly creamy. The recipe advises shaping the cookies into balls using two tablespoons of dough per cookie, but I though that seemed a bit small, so I used a #24 scoop, which holds a little over two and a half tablespoons of dough (and yielded 21 cookies from a batch). I rolled the balls of dough in sanding sugar, flattened the tops slightly, and put them in the oven to bake.
The cookies developed large cracks during baking, and you take them out of the oven when they are still quite soft (the recipe indicates that they are done when the cookies have "wet fissures" on top). When the cookies were still warm, I didn't particularly like the texture -- it was soft and cakelike. But when I tried one the following morning, the texture had firmed up quite a bit, and I liked the cookie a lot better. I wouldn't say that the cookies are "chewy," as the name of the recipe states. They are soft, dense, and fudgy.
I like these cookies, but I don't love them. The mint flavor is surprisingly underwhelming, especially considering how much peppermint extract is in the dough. The cookies are quite rich, and I agree with the recipe headnote that classifies these as "a dessert experience" as opposed to a snack item. I think the best thing about the cookies is the way they look -- with the wide cracks and sparkly sugar, they are beautifully festive. And in that regard, this does seem like a good choice for a holiday cookie. But I'm going to stick with Katzen's recipe for my regular mint-chocolate fix.
Recipe: "Chewy Chocolate Mint Cookies with Chocolate Chunks" from Baked Elements: Our 10 Favorite Ingredients, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.
As I read through the ingredient list, it was a bit unusual for a drop cookie. The recipe doesn't require whole eggs, but an egg white only -- and it includes a large quantity of corn syrup. To make the dough, you cream together softened butter and dark brown sugar, add all of the wet ingredients (corn syrup, egg while, peppermint extract, and vanilla), and then mix in all of the dry ingredients (flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, salt, and chocolate chunks). Then you chill the dough for at least 24 hours (incidentally, I always chill the dough for Katzen's chocolate chip mint cookies even though it's not called for in the recipe -- the final texture always turns out better).
I ended up chilling the dough for 48 hours before baking. The dough was oddly creamy. The recipe advises shaping the cookies into balls using two tablespoons of dough per cookie, but I though that seemed a bit small, so I used a #24 scoop, which holds a little over two and a half tablespoons of dough (and yielded 21 cookies from a batch). I rolled the balls of dough in sanding sugar, flattened the tops slightly, and put them in the oven to bake.
I like these cookies, but I don't love them. The mint flavor is surprisingly underwhelming, especially considering how much peppermint extract is in the dough. The cookies are quite rich, and I agree with the recipe headnote that classifies these as "a dessert experience" as opposed to a snack item. I think the best thing about the cookies is the way they look -- with the wide cracks and sparkly sugar, they are beautifully festive. And in that regard, this does seem like a good choice for a holiday cookie. But I'm going to stick with Katzen's recipe for my regular mint-chocolate fix.
Recipe: "Chewy Chocolate Mint Cookies with Chocolate Chunks" from Baked Elements: Our 10 Favorite Ingredients, by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, recipe available here at Baked Sunday Mornings.
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