System Requirements:
- Stand mixer
- Half-sheet pans
- Parchment paper
- 2-ounce disher
- Normal kitchen utensils and containers
Perhaps you don't "need" to do them this way, but the equipment and procedures are as much a part of the difference between these and regular "Toll-House" cookies as are the ingredient differences. Also, a digital kitchen scale that reads in grams (most do, at least +/-2 grams, which is fine) is necessary, although the very first time you measure brown sugar in *grams* instead of in some sort of "is this what they meant by 'packed'?" will make that worthwhile. (Also, flour is best measured by weight, as it can settle or be aerated and give vastly unpredictable results.) Anyway, on to the "recipe"...
- 640 grams bread flour ("for bread machines" is even better)
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 2 teaspoons table salt
Put the flour in a bowl, then add the baking soda and salt on top. Stir with a dry balloon whisk to aerate the flour and thoroughly distribute the baking soda and salt. Set aside for now.
- 4 large eggs
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract (not imitation or double-strength)
Crack the eggs into a smallish bowl, and pour about a tablespoon or so of vanilla extract on top. Whisk to a "lightly beaten" stage. (It doesn't have to be "foamy", but it should be well-integrated and a bit lightened in color.) Set aside for now.
- 600 grams brown sugar
- 1 pound unsalted butter
Dump the brown sugar into your local stand mixer, then cube the butter (to chunks about the size of a quarter stick or so) and dump it on top. Using the paddle attachment, cream the brown sugar and butter together -- you should start on a medium-low speed and run it all the way up to pretty high speed by the time you're done here. (It should look and smell a lot like a rich cake frosting before moving on to the next step.)
Now, with the stand mixer running at a medium-high speed (something like a seven, plus or minus one, on a scale of 1 to 10), slowly pour the egg mixture into the stand mixer bowl. You probably want to go with the rule of thirds or so (add some, let it integrate, then add more) until it's all in. Once it's all in the bowl (which will make the bowl's mixture look a lot like a brown batter), it's time for the next step.
Dial the mixer all the way down to 1 or 2 (on the 10-scale), and using whatever conveniences you have handy, calmly follow the rule of thirds and dump about a third of the flour mixture into the stand mixer's bowl. Give it a second to "wet" the flour, then run the speed all the way up (in steps, if you want to be cautious). After a couple moments, you won't see any flour, so repeat with the next load. Once all the flour is integrated, let the stand mixer run full-tilt for something like a minute. (This will whip more air into the dough while also improving the potential amount of "chewy" worked into the flour -- the bread flour has more protein to promote "chewy", which is why it was used.)
- 2 (10-12 ounce) packages of any chips (chocolate, peanut butter, mint, whatever)
Finally, drop the speed down to 1 or 2 ("stir") and dump the chips into the bowl. It should barely be a few seconds before they're folded through the cookie dough. (Don't keep stirring too long -- once they're folded in, you'll just be bashing them up.) Now, for the baking...
Tear sheets of parchment paper (basically silicone-treated paper) of sufficient size to cover half-sheet pans (the common size available everywhere restaurant goods are sold, and most other stores these days). Then, using a
two-ounce disher (i.e. the restaurant portion-control "ice cream scoop" thingy), portion six dough balls onto the parchment paper on each half-sheet pan. (I recommend the "scoop and sweep" method: scoop up a disher of dough, slide a spatula across the open face of the disher to sweep any excess off, then drop it onto the parchment paper.)
Bake in something like a 350°F oven (maybe 375°F, maybe less -- ovens have personalities) until golden brown and delicious. (These cookies aren't designed for dark brown and crunchy, although that may work; the perfectly done spot just past undercooked gives them the best results.) As each half-sheet pan is done, remove it to the counter for several minutes to allow the cookies to set. Then and only then, slide the entire parchment paper sheet onto a waiting mesh/grid-style cooling rack. (I actually wait almost until the next round is ready to hit the oven before I move the previous sheet from pan to rack. Since you're portioning them onto parchment paper, you can wait that long. All you do is slide the cooling cookies' paper onto a rack and then slide the next parchment paper sheet of cookies-to-be onto the now-vacant half-sheet pan.)
Once the cookies are *fully* cooled (if any make it that far), use kitchen shears (or scissors, or a dive knife) to slice the parchment paper apart, leaving you with individual cookies, each on a "placemat". They can then be stacked, bagged, or otherwise distributed without any concerns about sticking together and becoming the old "log-o'-cookies".
Makes... um... a bunch of 4-inch diameter delicious cookies. I don't recall how many, but it's basically "twice a standard Toll-House" worth of dough, with cookies significantly larger than "standard Toll-House" -- more like "Subway"-sized. A Toll-House recipe is officially sixty cookies, so I think this post should work out to about two dozen *real* cookies.
