Just about everyone loves the smell and taste of homemade cookies. Yet many people think baking is difficult, whether it be cakes, cookies or pies. Time poor cookie lovers choose shop bought products full of excess sugar and preservatives when it is actually very simple to bake cookies at home.
Even the complete novice can make these delicious cookies in a matter of minutes and, whilst practice may produce a better result as confidence grows, anyone following this recipe precisely should be proud of their first attempt.
Preparation
Before starting to cook anything, get out all the ingredients making sure the butter or margarine has been taken out of the fridge. If it is a cold day, wait a while for the butter to soften.
Whilst this recipe only makes a dozen or so cookies, make sure that two baking trays are available as the cookies will spread out during cooking. If only one tray can be found, bake the cookies in two batches instead.
Ingredients For Chewy Chocolate Cookies
- 75g/3oz softened butter or sunflower margarine
- 75g/3oz granulate sugar
- 75g/3oz soft brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 175g/6oz self raising flour
- 1 x 100g bar milk chocolate
Makes 12-15 cookies
Method
- Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F).
- Lightly grease 2 baking trays (non-stick is best).
- Cream sugar and butter or margarine together until smooth.
- Beat in egg.
- Fold in flour and chocolate.
- Place large teaspoons of mixture onto the trays, spacing well apart - maximum of 8 cookies per tray.
- Cook in the pre heated oven for 10-12 minutes.
- Remove from oven when cookies have “spread” and are still slightly “gooey” in the middle.
- Remove the cake from oven and allow to cool for 1 minute maximum.
- Remove cookies from tray with a large wide palette knife and place onto a wire rack.
- Put the kettle on, allow cookies to cool for a few minutes, then enjoy with a hot mug of tea or coffee.
Baking Tips
The cookies will seem a little undercooked after only 10-12 minutes but this means they will be lovely and chewy.
Many of the best cookie recipes in the world advise a much longer cooking time but do not be tempted to leave in the oven for a few more minutes or the cookies will be more like biscuits.
Once cool, if not eaten straightaway, store the chocolate cookies in a cake tin or simply pop into foil and leave in the fridge, if there are any left that is!
Alternative Ingredients – Try This
- Replace milk chocolate with white or dark chocolate or even your favorite chocolate bar. Toblerone and Terry’s Chocolate Orange work extremely well!
- Use 50g dried raisins instead of half the chocolate.
- Add some grated orange rind to the basic chocolate cookie recipe or some chopped nuts of your choice.
Baking the Perfect Cookie
Be sure to weigh the ingredients exactly and pre heat the oven fully before placing the cookies inside for perfect results. Inexperienced cooks may also want to read these additional tips on cookie baking.
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