Hazelnut Chocolate Chip Cookies: because thats the perfect combination of nuts and chocolate

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Ah, chocolate chip cookies. They are such a classic – a perfect dessert to munch on, binge on, or just dunk and savor. Whichever way you eat them, we can all agree that chocolate chip cookies are amazing. I found this recipe off Pinterest when searching “best chocolate chip cookie recipe”. The pin lead me to a recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction. The idea behind this recipe is to make the absolute chewiest cookies possible. I personally love my cookies to be soft and chewy, whereas, my mom prefer them crunchy. It’s the great “Team Edward” “Team Jacob” debate of our household. (Although, I personally would go Team Angel any day). Confession – I kind screwed up at the end and held my cookies in the oven a bit too long. They didn’t burn or anything, they turned out quite well, if I say so myself.  However, they weren’t super chewy; they were more like “kind of chewy”. That’s a technical term by the way. So I guess my cookies were a happy medium, both my mom and I approve. I took the liberty to spice up the recipe a bit and add a crunchy helping of hazelnuts into the mix. So, if you would like to know how to make some hazelnut chocolate chip cookies, just keep reading.

First up, let’s get started with preparing the hazelnuts. You can toss them in a toaster oven or just put them in a pan on medium heat until they turn dark and the skin starts to split. This will help us to peel them later. Make sure not to burn them though.

Once the hazelnuts have cooled down enough for you to handle, grab a handful and start rubbing them together. The friction of the hazelnuts rubbing together should remove all of the skin. This can get kind of messy, so clean the nuts over the sink or a trashcan. Then set them aside.

Combine the flower, baking soda, cornstarch, and salt in a bowl. Make sure to mix well. You don’t want to bite into a cookie and get a nice junk of baking soda. (Speaking from experience here). Also, make sure to measure out the flower properly. I have a feeling that I used a bit too much flower because, as you will see later, my cookies didn’t spread in the oven as much as in the original recipe.

In a medium size bowl, whisk together the melted butter, brown sugar, and white sugar until there are no more big clumps of sugar. Whisk your egg and egg yolk into your sugar mixture. Then whisk in the vanilla extract. Few, that was a lot of whisking.

I find that most American recipes use way too much sugar for my taste. I used a little less than half a cup of each sugar. I would have used less but I was also using 72% dark chocolate, so I figured that the bitterness of the chocolate and the sugar should balance out quite nice. It did. Most chocolate chip recipes use room temp. butter. The reason we are melting ours is because this will make the cookies even chewier. Also, you don’t have to use an electric mixer.

Dump your wet ingredients into your dry ingredients and use a rubber spatula to mix everything up. This will take a couple of minutes of mixing before the dough starts to come together. It will be clumpy and crumbly, so just use the back of your spatula to mold it together.

Grab a chopping board and a chef’s knife. Chop up your hazelnuts. This was harder said than done because the nuts are very round and would keep rolling off the table. There was lots of bending over and picking up. I find it was easier to work with small amounts of hazelnuts at a time, and to go slowly at first. Once you break them up a bit, the rest of the way is easy. Just chop, chop, chop away. If you are using a big chunk of chocolate or a chocolate bar, chop that up as well.

Fold the hazelnuts and chocolate into your dough. I used my hands to shape the dough into a nice ball in the center of the bowl. Cover the bowl with plastic and put it in the refrigerator to chill out for about two hours. You need to do this so that the dough comes together. It will also be easier to mold. You can make the dough a few days in advance and keep it in the fridge for up to three days.

Take the dough out of the fridge and let it defrost for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, go ahead and preheat the oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a baking sheet with either parchment paper or a silicone baking sheet.

Start rolling the dough into small balls. I’m pretty sure I made my balls a little too big, which probably added to the fact that they didn’t spread so well. Place the dough balls on the baking sheet making sure to keep some distance between them. This is the opportune time to sneak a taste of your cookie dough. However, I don’t recommend this because salmonella, you know. Just saying, that didn’t stop me from tasting about a good spoonful. I’m a bad role model.

Bake the cookies for 11 to 12 minutes. When they come out, they will look undercooked which is the whole point. They should continue the baking process on the baking sheet while they cool. I got skeptical at this point and held my cookies in the oven for another 5 minutes. This is why my cookies are not as chewy as the ones in the original recipe. Just trust me here. If you want supper chewy cookies, then hold them in the oven for 12 minutes tops. Let the cookies rest on the cookie sheet for 10 minutes then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Now grab a cookie or maybe two or three. Pair them with a tall glass of milk or some steaming tea. Sit down, relax, and enjoy the chewy goodness and melting chocolate!

Hazelnut Chocolate Chip Cookies

• Servings: 16
• Time: 3hrs
• Difficulty: easy
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Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup of hazelnuts
• 2 and 1/4 cups (280 grams) all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 and 1/2 teaspoons cornstarch
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup (1.5 sticks or 170 grams) unsalted butter, melted
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar, loosely packed
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1 large egg + 1 egg yolk*
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 3/4 cup chocolate chips or chocolate chunks

Directions:

1. Toast the hazelnuts in either a toaster oven or in a pan on the stovetop until they are dark and the skin is splitting. Let cool. Rub the hazelnuts together until the skin comes off.

2. Toss together the flour, baking soda, cornstarch and salt in a large bowl. Set aside.

3. In a medium size bowl, whisk the melted butter, brown sugar, and white sugar together until no brown sugar lumps remain. Whisk in the egg, then the egg yolk. Finally, whisk in the vanilla.

4. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix together with a large spoon or rubber spatula. The dough will be very soft, yet thick.

5. Chop up the hazelnuts and chocolate (if you are not using chocolate chips)

6. Fold in the chocolate and hazelnuts. They may not stick to the dough because of the melted butter, but do your best to have them evenly dispersed among the dough. Cover the dough and chill in the refrigerator for 2 hours, or up to 3 days. Chilling is mandatory.

7. Take the dough out of the refrigerator and allow to slightly soften at room temperature for 10 minutes. Preheat the oven to 325F degrees. Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. Set aside.

8. Roll the dough into balls, about 3 Tablespoons of dough each. The dough will be crumbly, but the warmth of your hands will allow the balls to stay intact. Roll the cookie dough balls to be taller rather than wide, to ensure the cookies will bake up to be thick. Put the balls of dough onto each cookie sheet. Press a few more chocolate chips/chunks on top of the dough balls for looks, if desired.

9. Bake the cookies for 11-12 minutes. The cookies will look very soft and underbaked. They will continue to bake on the cookie sheet. Allow to cool on the cookie sheet for 10 minutes before moving to a wire rack to cool completely.

Cookies stay soft and fresh for 7 whole days at room temperature. Cookies may be frozen up to 3 months. Rolled cookie dough may be frozen up to three months and baked in their frozen state for 12 minutes.

*Room temperature egg + egg yolk are preferred for even disbursement.  Typically, if a recipe calls for room temperature or melted butter, it’s a good idea to use room temperature eggs as well.  To bring eggs to room temperature quickly, simply place the whole eggs into a glass of warm water for 5 minutes..

Parmesan, Herb, and Garlic Popovers: or what happens when you bake pancake batter

So what are popovers exactly? Well I’m glad you asked! Popovers are this amazingly delicious and versatile pastry. You can make them savory or sweet and eat them with anything, or just gobble them up on their own. The batter for popovers is essentially the same batter you use to make pancakes – flower, milk and eggs. The whole idea of popovers is that they expand and “pop over” the top of the muffin tins. Whenever I make popovers at home, my brother and I sit in front of the oven door and watch how they expand. But don’t worry, they won’t spill over too much and make a mess. Hopefully.

This particular recipe from Jane’s Sweets and Baking Journal makes savory popovers with garlic. (Something you should probably know about me – I am obsessed with garlic. So don’t be surprised when I double or triple the amount of garlic in some recipes) However, if you would like something sweet, you can always change up the toppings. Recipes are not written in stone. There is always wriggle room for creativity in flavor.

First up you should preheat your oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit. Then grease your pan so the popovers won’t stick. The original recipe yields 12 popovers. I decided to half the recipe for a result of six because I only had one popover pan.

Pour the milk into a saucepan and set it on a low heat while you prepare the rest of the ingredients. Make sure to stir the milk occasionally and don’t let it boil. You just want the milk lukewarm. If it’s too hot, you’ll make scrambled eggs instead of pastry.

In a medium bowl, sift flower and then add the salt and baking powder. Stir to combine.

In an electric mixer with the wire whisk attachment, beat the eggs on a low speed until they become uniform. If you don’t have an electric mixer, this can easily be done by hand (and you won’t have to deal with cleaning the mixer afterwards).

Once the eggs are combined, add the warm milk. Test the milk’s temperature with your finger to make sure it didn’t get too hot. Now you can slowly start adding the flower mixture. While the mixer is still running, add the flower in gradually. Increase the mixer’s speed and let the whisk do its thing for two more minutes. Turn off the mixer and cover the bowl with plastic. Let your batter rest for about an hour. It just went through quite a lot of exercise and needs to rest a bit before we can continue.

While the batter is taking a nap, start working on the topping. In a small bowl mix the cheese and spices together. The original recipe also called for chopped garlic, but I omitted that because I was afraid that the garlic would just burn and turn bitter. (This proved to be a wise decision as the resulting popovers got very brown). But don’t worry, I compensated with the lack of garlic by adding some garlic powder instead. This is the part of the recipe where you can get creative. Add whatever spices or flavors you like to the mixture. If you want sweet popovers, try a combination of brown sugar and cinnamon.

Now that our batter has rested, we can fill up our popover cups. You want to pour the batter almost to the top, but not quite. Sprinkle the cheese mixture on top of each cup. The more the merrier. Place a square of butter on top of each cup of batter. I forgot to divide the amount of butter by 2 and put a whole lot more than was needed. It bubbled over and spilled into the oven making quite a mess. However, the popovers turned out nice and brown. And I think I learned my lesson about reading carefully as I kneeled on the floor scrubbing at the burnt butter on the bottom of the oven. Oh well.

Here comes the fun part. Put the popovers into the oven and set the timer for 15 minutes. Grab a comfy pillow and plop down on the floor in front of the oven door. You should start to see the popovers grow after about 5 minutes, give or take. IMPORTANT – do not open the oven door at this time. In fact, for best results, do not open the oven door at all while the popovers are baking. After the 15 minutes, turn the heat down to 375 for about 25 to 30 minutes, or until the popovers turn a deep gold brown and look crispy.

Take the popovers out of the oven and immediately poke the tops with a knife. This creates a small opening for the steam to escape which makes the inside of the popovers nice and dry instead of getting soggy. Nobody wants soggy popovers.

So this here is my result. Granted, they don’t look as perfect as the popovers in original pin, but I’m absolutely certain that they taste just as good. Yes, I know that there is some bias in that judgment, but I received similar opinions from family and friends. Don’t believe me? Try them out yourself. I’m sure you probably have most of the ingredients in kitchen already. (If not, you can always improvise)

These popovers should preferably be eaten as soon as they cool down enough so that you don’t burn your fingers. However, they can last for up to a week if you keep them in a closed container. Pop them in a toaster oven for a couple of minutes to heat back up. Microwaves will just make them soggy, and we worked so hard for that lovely brown crunchiness. Don’t let all that work go to waste. But most importantly, eat up and enjoy!

Parmesan, Herb, and Garlic Popovers

• Servings: 6
• Time: 1hr and 20mins
• Difficulty: easy
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Ingredients:

• 1 and ¾ cups milk
• 2 cups All-Purpose flour
• 1 tsp. kosher salt
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 3 large eggs, at room temperature
• 1/4 cups grated parmesan cheese
• 1 Tsp. Garlic powder
• 1 Tsp. Dried thyme
• 1 Tsp. Fresh rosemary
• 1 Tsp. Dried basil
• 1 Tsp. Oregano
• Salt
• Pepper
• 2 Tbsp. unsalted butter, cut into 6 equal chunks for topping

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Generously grease 6 popover cups or jumbo muffin cups; grease the top of the pan(s) as well. Place each pan on a baking sheet.
2. In a saucepan, heat the milk until it’s just lukewarm, about 110 degrees, then take it off the heat.
3. Sift the flour, salt, and baking powder into a medium mixing bowl.
4. In the large bowl of your electric mixer, fitted with the wire whisk, beat the eggs on low speed for about 3 minutes, until they look pale and foamy, then add in the warm milk. Add the flour in gradually, still mixing at low speed, then raise the speed to medium and beat for 2 more minutes.
5. Let the batter rest in its bowl, unrefrigerated, for one hour. While the batter is resting, mix together the remaining spices and cheese.
6. After the batter is done resting, fill each well-greased cup with batter, almost to the top.Sprinkle at least one tablespoon of the cheese-herb mixture on top of each one. Plop a chunk of butter on top of that.
7. With the pans on baking sheets, place the popovers into the oven and bake for 15 minutes at 450 degrees. Then, turn the oven down to 375 degrees. Bake 25 to 30 minutes longer, or until the popovers look very crispy and are a deep golden brown on the outside. As soon as you take them out, puncture the tops carefully with the tip of a knife; this will allow excess steam to escape and help prevent the insides from becoming soggy.
8. Best served warm. Freeze any extras after they’re cooled. Reheat these easily, even if frozen, in a warm oven. They’ll be almost as good as new.