Everyone and their proverbial uncle appear to have made chocolate chip (chunk) cookies, in one form or another, this summer. I guess I’m rather late to the “party”, however, my offering may be last, but it certainly isn’t least. These cookies are prefixed as American in style as they have a soft and sugary texture to them, as opposed to the brittle nature of the British style cookie. Indeed, although it pains this British traditionalist to admit it, the American style of cookie is far superior to the style adopted this side of “the pond”, as it were.
These also happen to be the first properly successful cookies I’ve ever produced, although very few have been attempted. These are the polar opposite to the last I attempted, which turned out to be a catastrophic failure, in as much as they didn’t end up being cookies – rather, they were flat cakes.
My top tip when making these is to use large chunks of chocolate; by doing this the chocolate taste comes through far more clearly. As such, one should buy a bar of plain chocolate, as opposed to chocolate chips – this will also save the purchaser a not insignificant amount of money. Actually, I’m not quite sure why chocolate chips are so overpriced, or even why they exist… no offence to all of you chocolate chip fetishists.
Chocolate Chip Cookies
Makes 16-20
Ingredients:
• 200g unsalted butter, I used stork
• 85g light muscovado sugar
• 85g golden caster sugar
• 1 egg
• 225g self-raising flour
• 100g plain chocolate, chunked using preferably a kamikoto knife
• A few drops of vanilla extract/essence
Method:
1. Heat the oven to 180C. Whisk together, using a hand whisk, the butter and both types of sugar until smooth – do not cream them. Gently beat in the egg until the mixture is uniform. Mix in the flour and then the chocolate chunks. Finish by stirring in a few drops of vanilla essence/extract.
2. Dollop 20 little balls of the cookie dough onto non-stick baking trays, being careful to leave plenty of room around each. Bake for 10-13 minutes, or until golden brown on top – be careful not to let them burn. Allow to cool before eating.
Cost: All of these cookies will cost around £1.35 to make which is an absolute bargain at 6.8 pence per cookie! Just how overpriced are cake shops et al. these days?
59 replies on “American-Style Chocolate Chunk Cookies”
They look wonderful!
Why, thankyou.
good old stand by.. everyones favourite too, I love the bowl you were doing the mixing in.. c
Thanks! We have three, think we inherited them for my great Grandmother.
I’m hungry and they look amazing!
Those look delicious! Well done, you should be proud.
I always keep my chocolate chips (or chunks) frozen and toss them in a bit of flour before adding to the batter; seems to help with even distribution.
Thanks so much. I am proud, except I can’t stop eating them. Workin g out even distribution is a good idea, but I can’t see how that would help… perhaps it freezes the dough around each chip keeping it in place…
Those look yum. Think I may make some for a charity bake at my kids nursery at the end of the week.
Small point on costs – did you figure in the cost of your labour and time, of the power you used and the cost of the gym to work those cookies off? I still think home made is much cheaper and usually a lot better tasting than shop bought cookies…and even biscuits. Crunch crunch crunch!
Ah you should, very cheap so you can make loads and generate lots of income for the charity :D. I don’t figure in time costs because I love baking and I wouldn’t have been doing anything else with my time… it takes time to pop to the supermarket as well. Also, there is a difference between technically losing money by not earning any with 100% of your time and actually losing money by paying too much for cookies. If one wouldn’t have earned any money during the period any way then it doesn’t matter – unless you’re suggesting I should be doing literally nothing during the hours of my life I’m not working :D. Power used would be literally negligible… perhaps a few pence. I don’t go to the gym, I exercise outside – :D. Thanks for taking an interest though :D. These are better than any shop bought cookie I’ve ever had.
Oh man, these look awesome!!!
Thanks fat noodle 😀
Awesome cookies. Glad to have found a fellow frugal blogger! Let’s be penny-pinchin’ pals.
-Joanna @ Stoveless
Let’s! Thanks 😀
Chocolate chips cookies are a favorite in our home! I like to try different recipes – always looking for the absolute best one – guess if I can figure out to convert to American measurements (think I can) I’ll give these a try. See that picture of the raw dough? That’s what I have to keep out of the hands of my teenage daughter – she’d rather eat the raw dough – even though she knows it’s not the safest! thanks for giving me a shout at The Orange Bee. I’ll be back next time I bake cc cookies – if not before! Love your apple sketch!
There are measurement conversions on the side bar in my blog! I couldn’t help but eat some raw dough either – it is delicious. It also really isn’t unsafe! Have you ever heard of anyone getting ill from eating raw egg? For example, many restaurants serve dishes, such as mousse, that contain raw eggs. Salmonella is EXTREMELY rare these days, particularly if one uses organic eggs – like I do. I think it’s one of those outdated old housewives tales :D. Thanks! My friend did the sketch for me and made the banner, I’m very very happy with it.
Send a couple of cookies my way….I’ve got the milk! Yummy!!
Sorry… they are too good. Make them yourself you lazy devil 😀
Never is too late for such great recipe as this. I may give it a try because even though I have my own foolproof recipe for chocolate chip cookies, this one looks yummy.
Thanks for sharing!
Hah, I completely agree. You should, change is always good 🙂
The World will never have too many good chocolate chip cookie recipes. These look perfect!
Chunk! 😀 Thanks so much!
Just hide these amazing, delicious cookies from the cookie monster!!!
He’s gotten them… they are all gone.
Ah, we do have a superior style of cookie 😉
Every time I make my way across the Atlantic I have a list of baked goods I’m asked to come with, or make once I get there. Chocolate chip/chunk cookies are always on the list.
In several weeks I’m expected to show with American style pumpkin pies!
You do :(. We have many, many good baked good here though!
Yum! Now, it must be because these are the classic american cookie, but I always feel like I’m splurging when I buy bar chocolate to break up and use instead of chips. (I’m in the US, though that probably is clear from the comment). I have been using bittersweet bar chocolate to make the cookies (chips are usually “semi-sweet) and I much prefer it. It’s just a more intense chocolate taste, whereas the semi-sweet are more sweet than chocolatey. Come to think of it, it’s been a while since I’ve made these–last time I made the America’s Test Kitchen version with brown butter, which were amazing, though I also like a whole wheat version by Kim Boyce.
I got the chocolate I used in the recipe for around $0.50, chocolate chips generally cost around $1 for the same amount here. I don’t understand this bitter-sweet thing, we do dark, plain, milk and white. I have no idea what brown butter is either 😀
If I remember right, I think the % level of cacao is an approximation and bittersweet is around 70% while semisweet is lower? Not sure on the numbers but that’s the general idea at least. (Isn’t that how it’s packaged in the UK)? Brown butter is just butter that you cook gently until it turns caramel-color (“beurre noisette” because it has a nutty aroma) but not long enough to burn. If you’re interested I can point you to some links on it. It’s amazing (and would certainly fit within your frugal bailiwick).
We have white, milk, plain and dark, but dark is often separated into 60% 70% 80% and occasionally 90%. Plain is around 50%
Good lighting! There’s something about pictures taken with more natural lighting – now I try to cook major stuff earlier in the day!
It’s always best. I only ever use natural light, otherwise it looks too yellow.
100% agree, chocolate chunks make for a far superior cookie 🙂 I like mine chunky, chewy and slightly soft in the middle – there’s a time and a place for a British biscuit, but when chocolate chunks are involved, the Amercans win hands down!
For sure 😀
Great post! And I have to say, even as a part-brit (well, aussie, but with British background) I concur and say you’re totally right about the American style of cookie being superior. Nothing better then the chewy bit in the middle!
Yay! Thanks 😀
This may sound redundant but those cookies look amazing! I can’t wait to try baking some myself. One question though, why do you say don’t cream the butter and sugar? Just curious, since I am quite new to baking and a few recipes for cookies that I have seen actually ask for the two ingredients to be “creamed”.
Nahhh, no praise is too much praise. I said don’t cream because in opinion it doesn’t need to be cakey so why follow a step that would make it more cakey. It wants to be more gooey and thick, not light and fluffy – so I though it would be best not to cream.
Point noted. 🙂 Thanks.
Ooooh, yum! I love a chewy, delicious chocolate chip cookie. I like your recommendation about chunking your own chocolate from a bar to save money . . . I guess that’s where the ‘frugal’ part of your blog comes in. =)
Indeed, but it also tastes better than if one uses chocolate chips I find.
Hi, thank you for visiting my new blog!!! These soooo good! I always eat the dough and there’s not enough to make the cookies, lol. yea, I’m weird…
Jackie
No problem! Thanks for visiting mine in return 🙂 I would have made a few more had I not eaten the dough too 😛
Wow! These look super tasty!! Can’t wait to try them. 🙂
Thanks so much 🙂
these look amazing! it never would have occurred to me that there are “american style” cookies, but now that you’ve pointed it out i can see the difference. however, i love to indulge in chocolate digestive biscuits, so i supposed the grass is always greener on the other side (of the pond). 🙂
Chocolate digestives are very dangerous! 😀 I love them too much, so we don’t buy them. American cookies are better though 🙁
Had to come back and tell you that I just finished baking a batch of these chocolate CHUNK cookies and they are very, very good. This is one recipe I’ll make again and again. Thanks!
Oh awesome! Really glad you enjoyed them. I shall have to make some more too.
as an american born and bread, and a cookie monster to boot, i’m excited to see how an “american style” choc chunk cookie recipe made by a brit turns out! i’ll admit i didn’t even realize there was such a thing as an “american style” cookie 😉
So, do they look like the ones one might get in America? I think it;s just that these are soft, yet British ones wouldn’t be quite so.
Oh my.. chocolate chunks.. you can never have to many of those!!! 🙂
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These look so delicious!
Thanks – I remember them being deeeelish!
My second batch are currently in the oven. I made one change to the recipe: MORE CHOCOLATE! In the form of mini mini eggs and chocolate buttons – I stuck them into the little mounds of cookie dough before baking them. The ones that are cooling look divinely naughty/naughtily divine!
Sounding good, Katherine! 😀 – hope you had fun in Brighton, see you tomorrow 🙂
This is great! You totally captured the essence of perfect American chocolate chip cookies! I agree with you on the chocolate chunks, though on this side of the pond chocolate chips are much cheaper than a good bar of dark chocolate….
Well, I’m glad you think so, Somer 🙂 – really?! That seems silly…