Hi! Welcome to my blog. I am a major foodie, with a haphazard cooking philosophy, currently making that transition from cooking and baking for friends and family to 'wonder if I could make this my career'. Follow me for recipes, the outcomes of a few experiments, and general lovely foodiness. Opinions, reviews and recommendations are all my own.

Tuesday 12 March 2013

Super-Posh Chewy Cookies

Lovely people, let me tell you now, there are a lot of recipes out there that jostle for the title of 'World's Best Cookie'. And a lot of them are probably very worthy winners. This recipe however, for me, stands firmly above the rest, holding the belt high - the undefeated champion of champions, for oh so many reasons...

Super-Posh Chewy Cookies
Just look at them, they have everything don't they!? Cherries, almonds, two types of chocolate, vanilla, and that naughty little splash (Ok, glug) of cherry brandy. The recipe is originally from The Hairy Bikers, I found it many years ago on my quest for a great chewy cookie recipe. There were a couple of steps that didn't quite work for me, so I have adapted it slightly here in both the ingredients and method. That said, thank you to Dave and Simon for bringing these incredible cookies into my life!

Warning: There is a high risk that a large amount of the cookie dough will be consumed before you get around to baking it...

Ingredients (makes approx 20 medium sized cookies)

100g golden caster sugar
100g unsalted butter
2 tbsp sunflower or vegetable oil
100g soft brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 large free range egg
200g plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
100g glace cherries
2 tbsp cherry brandy
100g white chocolate chips
100g dark chocolate chips
75g chopped almonds or hazelnuts

Method

Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees, and lightly grease a large baking sheet.

In a large bowl, cream together the golden caster sugar and butter. Beat well until pale, light and fluffy.

Add the sunflower oil and brown sugar, and beat well again until well combined.

Add the vanilla extract and the egg, and mix well.

In a separate bowl, sift the flour, add the baking powder and salt and mix together. Add the dry ingredients to the mixture, and fold in, mixing to form a dough.

Chop the glace cherries into quarters, and add to the mixture, along with the cherry brandy. Stir well, so that the brandy is evenly distributed through the dough. The dough should now be quite loose and sticky, but holding its shape. 

Add the chocolate and the nuts, and stir through again so they are evenly distributed. 


Take a large spoonful of the mixture, form it into a ball, and place it on the baking sheet. Press down with the back of a spoon to flatten the ball. Repeat until the tray is full, leaving 1-2 inches between each cookie, as they will spread. 


Bake in the oven for 8-12 minutes. The cookies should be a golden brown colour, and a little darker around the edges when you take them out, but, and this is important, they should still be soft to the touch. The heat in the cookies will continue to cook them when they are out of the oven, so if they are hard when they come out, they will only harden further and lose their chewiness. 

Leave the cookies to cool on the tray for 5-10 minutes, until they are hard to touch. Lift them off then using a pallet knife, and place them on a tray to cool completely. 


You may need to bake these in batches, I only have one large baking sheet, so it normally takes me three batches to use all of the cookie dough. Inevitably, at least one of the cookies from batch one has disappeared before batch three make it off the baking sheet... 


What is the best cookie recipe you have ever found? Would love it if you would share the link in the comments box below..

V x

2 comments:

  1. hey, great mind think a like...I made cookies last night.Mine were of the double choc variety my gosh they good! it was a nigella recipe. They were like the ones you find in Greggs.
    http://www.nigella.com/recipes/view/totally-chocolate-chocolate-chip-cookies-29

    ReplyDelete
  2. I promised myself I'd be really good and concentrate on real work this week, but I had a massive drive to make today, so I thought cookies would keep me company! I was not wrong :-) x

    ReplyDelete

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