Chocolate Chip Cookies

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These are my favorite chocolate chip cookies. They are soft but with a slight crisp along the bottom outer edges. The key is coconut oil. They are perfect warm from the oven, but also delicious cool. They stay soft for days so making a double batch is never a mistake!

  • ¾ cup granulated sugar

  • ¾ cup brown sugar (light or dark, your choice)

  • 1 cup fat* (choose 2: ½ cup coconut oil, ½ cup butter, ½ cup vegan butter, ½ cup margarine)

  • 2 eggs

  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

  • 1 teaspoon black walnut flavoring** (optional)

  • 2 ½ cups all purpose flour

  • 1 teaspoon baking soda

  • 1 teaspoon salt

  • 9 ounces chocolate chips

Ingredients

cookie dough ready to bake

  1. Melt your coconut oil/ vegan butter/ margarine/ butter. Short bursts in the microwave works well for this.

  2. Using a stand mixer or electric hand mixer, cream the melted fats together with the brown sugar and granulated sugar. 

  3. Add the eggs one at a time, thoroughly mixing after each addition. Add the extracts and thoroughly mix.

  4. Add the flour, baking soda, and salt and mix, just until combined. Add in the chocolate chips and mix just until thoroughly distributed.

  5. Cover and chill the dough for 30 minutes - 24 hours. (See notes for faster options!)

  6. If your dough has chilled longer than 30 minutes, let it sit at room temperature for 10 minutes or until it can be easily scooped. Preheat the oven to 375 °F. 

  7. Grease a cookie sheet. Scoop the dough into rough ball shapes of 1-2 tablespoons of dough each and place them on the cookie sheet with about 2 inches space between dough balls. If the dough has become sticky during shaping, place the cookie sheet in the refrigerator for a few minutes to allow the dough to firm up again.

  8. Bake for 7-8 minutes, just until you start to see golden brown spots on top of the cookies.  The bottoms should be lightly browned.

  9. Remove from the oven and let cool on the cookie sheet for 5-10 minutes.  Then remove to wax paper to cool thoroughly.  Place in an air tight container.

Notes:

* I strongly recommend using coconut oil for half of the fat in these cookies, even if you eat dairy.  The texture is amazing - much better than a cookie made entirely with butter!  For a dairy-free cookie, use coconut oil and vegan butter.  If you can't have coconut, a combination of butter and margarine yields a better texture than all butter.

** Black walnut extract can be hard to find.  My parents can find it, but I have yet to see it in a store where I live.  In some places, it will be available around Christmas, but no other time of year.  Its a nice addition if you can find it, but not critical.

This dough will be very soft when you mix it up.  It really needs to chill to prevent excessive spreading in the oven.  Prolonged time in the fridge improves the taste and texture of cookies. If I plan ahead, I'll make the dough the night before I want cookies, but chilling for 30 minutes or so works too.  If you need cookies NOW, go ahead and form the dough balls (dough will be sticky!) and place them on the cookie sheet.  Then put the whole cookie sheet in the fridge for 10 minutes, or as long as you have.  The cookie-sized dough balls will chill much faster than the mixing bowl full of dough.

chocolate chip cookie dough

Don't worry if your cookies look puffy right out of the oven.  They crinkle as they cool.  The cookie on the left in this picture is fresh out of the oven.  The one on the right has cooled a few minutes.

Cookie Crinkling

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