Strange cookie dough method from CI... why?

[Katie Nell]

So, I conquered the oatmeal cookies, so I'm back on to finding the perfect chocolate chip cookie (chewy, thank you very much!), and I was trying to decide which recipe to try next. I checked out Cook's Illustrated to see what they had to say. They have a recipe for Thick and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies, which uses methods to produce chewy cookies that I've mostly heard of before. They also give a reason behind most of these methods. However, one of the methods they don't explain the reasoning at all. They tell you to gather a 1/4 cup of dough into a ball, and using both hands, take your fingertips and pull the ball into two equal parts. Then they want you to rotate those two pieces ninety degrees and join them together again into one cookie dough mound, with the rough edges exposed, being careful not to smooth it out. What do you suppose the madness is to this method?

[stonefruit]

I've made those cookies dozens of times -- I think the main reason to do the dough trick is to get the cookies to be big and symmetrical. I always skip that part, and everyone loves those cookies. I've spent 25 years looking for the best chocolate-chip cookie, and with this CI thick and chewy recipe, I'm done. I usually chop up Ghiradelli semi-sweet baking bars instead of using chocolate chips.

[smartie]

cookie dough is fab in a cheesecake

[misterbrucie]

A couple of suggestions: Use approx. 1/2 oat flour. Adds smoothness & chewiness. Also, DARK brown sugar has more moisture (more chewiness). And go short on the baking soda.

[bolletje]

I always use a modified cookie recipe of my own invention that combines my favorite aspects of all the recipes I've tried but is mainly based on the back of the bag nestle's tollhouse recipe.

Basically, its 2 sticks of butter, melted; 3/4 cup each of white and dark brown sugar; 2 eggs and 1 tsp of Penzey's double strength vanilla extract; 2 cups flour, 1 tsp. salt, 1 tsp baking soda and a generous pinch of Penzeys korintje cinnamon, 2 cups callebaut semi-sweet chocolate chips.

Melt the butter over very low heat in a large cooking pot. Then addd the sugars and stir until blended, if the butter/sugar mixture is cool enough not to cook them, add the eggs and vanilla, stir again. Then add all the dry ingredients and combine. Lastly, add the chocolate chips and if you're using toasted nuts or anything else you want. Bake teaspoons of dough at 350 degrees for 9 minutes (makes small cookies).

The combination of high-quality penzey's vanilla and cinnamon with the callebaut chocolate makes the flavor really intense and the use of less flour and melted butter makes the cookie very buttery and sort of crispy. If you like a chewier cookie, add more flour.

[Katie Nell]

I tried this recipe last night sans fussy method, and it is really good! I'd have to do a side by side comparison with The Good Cookie recipe when I get the book, but I think this one has more brown sugar and might be the winner of best chewy chocolate chip cookie so far! I brought some to work for my lunch today, but I'm having a tough time resisting them right now and it's not even 8 am!

[adamclyde]

If you make it again, try doing just a couple with the odd break method to see if you notice any difference...

I've been looking for a good cookie recipe. sounds like I should give this one a try.

[chowser]

I just did them, one tray with the method, one without. With the CI method, you get a round cookie w/ the wrinkly top. If you just roll a ball, then you get a round cookie w/ a slightly less wrinkly top. If you plop dough, you get the wrinkly top w/out a perfectly round cookie. The recipe itself is great and has been one of my favorite go-to recipes for years. It takes very little time to do the CI method, maybe seconds more than the others so I'll continue to do it that way.

Oh, one great addition to this is to use half chocolate chips and half toffee bits. Play with the dough because sometimes I have to add a little more flour to play against the extra fat from the toffee but even if it flattens out some, it's still really good.

[adamclyde]

Thanks for the side by side comparison. I'm definitely going to try this. My wife is the dessert baker of the house, but great chocolate chip cookies have always been elusive for us.

Thanks again.

- Adam

[chowser]

If you're looking for some good smaller chocolate chip cookies, this is a good thread below. I really like the first cookie recipe and the Williams-Sonoma one posted near the bottom. They're better than the CI regular chocolate chip cookie recipe (which calls for a tiny quantity of water which I don't get--I use vanilla for that). They both make chewy, buttery cookies that are slightly crisp but with a nice chewy center.

http://www.chowhound.com/topics/31782...

[Katie Nell]

Yeah, I've tried that recipe and wasn't in love with it, although it was quite a while ago. I actually started this thread a long time ago: http://www.chowhound.com/topics/27868... My favorite in my quest so far has been the soft-baked chocolate chip cookie from The Good Cookie, by Tish Boyle, but I certainly haven't tried them all yet!

[chowser]

Which did you try, the first one or the WS one? I liked both of them but can't remember what the individual results were like.
Is the Good Cookie recipe posted somewhere? I don't see it in that thread. Did I miss it?

[Katie Nell]

The WS one. No, I actually don't have The Good Cookie one right now... I checked it out over Christmas from the library, and after loving about 6 or 7 recipes from it, decided to buy it... it's on its way! I can't find the recipe online, but I can post it when I get the book.

[foiegras]

Try using 50/50 flour & the original TollHouse recipe (see Maida Heatter). I also use Godiva 60% chips.

[sweet ginger]

I've done it both ways and find that when you just scoop the dough onto the baking pan, when it bakes up it has a smoother finish on top, especially because of the melted, rather than creamed, butter used. Pulling the dough apart and smooshing the two halves together gives you a cookie with a "craggier", rougher finish- more aesthetically pleasing and if I remember correctly, helps with the chewiness in texture- more surface area that gets baked. I tore the recipe out, so I only have the second page of the article and it doesn't say anything about methodology, so I'm assuming a rationale was given in the first half of the article. That said, I usually just scoop, due to time constraints and think this is the best chocolate chip cookie recipe I've ever come across.

[chowser]

I agree--this is my favorite big chocolate chip cookie recipe. Makes great chipwiches, too.

The rotation adds texture to the cookie so it looks like a bakery one. I like doing it, only takes a couple of minutes.

[curiousbaker]

I do it, too, and there's a small difference. Only worth it is you're, like me, fussy and fond of fiddling with dough. The recipe is great either way.

[Davwud]

Hey Ginger

Which CI is it in??

Thanks
DT

[JK Grence the Cosmic Jester]

It's the January 1996 issue.

[Davwud]

Care to share it since mine only go back to 2000??

DT

[chowser]

See the thread I posted just below this and it's in there.

[chowser]

It's also in the Best Recipe cookbook. In this thread:

http://www.chowhound.com/topics/30513...

[JK Grence the Cosmic Jester]

You are exactly correct, it's done for the aesthetics. You can skip the tear and smoosh easily if you want to.

[maillard]

I think they just like to make things complicated. :)

[rockycat]

Beats me. I've tried that method on a different cookie recipe and I honestly couldn't tell any difference between doing that and just plopping the dough on the sheet. I seem to remember that the recipe did have a typical CI-type overblown explanation for the odd methodology but I can't remember what it was and didn't see any special benefit to the extra work.