Friday, October 30, 2009

Ultimate Chocolate Dipped Cookies

My recipe to bake this week was the Ultimate Chocolate Dipped Cookies. A skill level of 2 meant that this recipe was a medium recipe, and I learned why at the beginning and end of cooking.

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 12-ounce package semisweet chocolate chips
3/4 cup butter
1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar (meaning make sure you pat down the sugar together when measuring)
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup white chocolate chips
1 recipe Chocolate Ganache

Now here is my modified version of the recipe...

Preheat oven to 350F
In a medium bowl stir together the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, and salt
In a medium sized saucepan combine 2 cups of chocolate pieces and 2 tablespoons of the butter. Set aside.
NOTE: Heat the chocolate on low!! If you do not, the chocolate will burn!
In a large mixing bowl, mix the remaining butter with the brown sugar. Then add in the eggs.
NOTE: You do not have to use an electric mixer, a regular hand held mixer works just as well.
Then mix in the chocolate mixture and vanilla.
Slowly mix in the flour mixture and once completely mixed add the white chocolate chips.
NOTE: Make sure the mixture still isn't warm from the chocolate mixture. Wait for it to cool otherwise chocolate chips will melt.
Drop a spoonful of dough about two inches apart on a ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake in oven for 8-10 minutes. Makes about 72 cookies and then place the cookies aside to cool.

Now for the chocolate ganache...
1 cup of heavy cream
9 oz of bittersweet chocolate

Set the stove on low and put in the heavy cream.
Gradually stir in the chocolate till you get a smooth mixture; take it off immediately.
NOTE: Do not cook any higher than low for the heavy cream will separate.

Once the cookies are cooled, dip in chocolate ganache and enjoy!

I found cooking the chocolate on the stove quite difficult for the chocolate MUST be cooked on low. I burned my chocolate the first time and for the ganache I had the heat on much too high.
Other than that, the mixture was quite easy to make and I had people coming from the floor above me to try and snatch a cookie. Overall, this mix is very delicious and I strongly recommend it, especially for a party since it makes a great amount of scrumptious cookies :)

4 comments:

  1. I think that it is really cool that you are cooking something different every week and great that you are makingthe time to do so. I myself cannot find the time to cook weekly, so I enjoy reading of your endeavors. Well done on the cookies.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I can understand your frustration when you ended up burning the chocolate. A similar thing happened to me last weekend... I was making chocolate glaze for my chocolate chip cheesecake and well... lets say its a good thing I didn't put the glaze on the cake, which turned our to be pretty good otherwise. A little sweet for cheesecake, but still pretty good.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yeah, I agree with David. Cooking can be time-consuming and expensive. Although I have a kitchen on my floor, I never really cook anything but noodles.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I love cooking but I have never tried baking before. You can hardly find an oven in Chinese kitchen since it is not used to cook Chinese food. Maybe I will try it in my dorm some day. btw, the NOTEs seem to be useful. I will be very careful when I bake Ultimate Chocolate Dipped Cookies.

    ReplyDelete