My all-time favorite chocolate chip cookies

Every year about this time, I start to bake like a mad woman. I need to find the perfect cookie in every category: simple sugar cookies that roll out like a dream, but aren't too sweet. Crisp chippers that have a little chew and are dense with chocolate morsels. Something in a bar, perhaps with nuts. I get a little crazy.

This is the chocolate chip cookie I come back to again and again. It simply puts all others to shame. It's from "Alice Medrich's Cookies and Brownies," which came out some years ago. Medrich has a new volume, "Chewy Gooey Crispy Crumbly Melt-in-Your-Mouth Cookies by Alice Medrich," which I have not baked out of yet. The chippers are made with melted butter and must sit overnight, so you can't make them on the spur of the moment. You stir the batter together in a saucepan, much like old-fashioned brownies.

They're everything a great cookie should be.

Chocolate chip cookies

Makes 3 dozen

2 1/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups chocolate chips plus 1 cup chopped walnuts or 3 cups chocolate chips


1. In a bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt to blend them.

2. In a large saucepan, melt the butter. Set it aside to cool.

3. Add the granulated and brown sugars to the butter. Stir in the eggs, one by one, followed by the vanilla.

4. Stir in the flour mixture. Stir in the chips and nuts, if using.

5. Transfer the batter to a plastic container, cover, and refrigerate for 1 day.

6. Let the dough sit out for 30 minutes to soften. Set the oven at 375 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.

7. Scoop the dough onto the baking sheets in walnut-sized balls. Bake the cookies for 12 to 14 minutes, rotating the sheets, or until they are firm to the touch. Slide the parchment paper onto wire racks to cool. Store in an airtight container. Adapted from "Alice Medrich's Cookies and Brownies"

Posted by Sheryl Julian December 6, 2010 04:43 PM , Boston Globe 12/22/2011