Friday, June 22, 2012

Chocolate chewy cookies


Every person has their own recipe for this sweet treat and my recipe is even better. This recipe was inspired by my brothers and their craving for sweet things. The texture of a 'perfect' cookie should be crunchy and golden on the outside and chewy and sweet on the inside. Personally,the main problem with every cookie recipe is the quantity of butter is too much to create a crunchy cookie. So, I have changed the quantities to make it healthier. I have included a variety of ingredients that make it even more delicious, from bitter dark chocolate to slightly toasted nutty almonds to chewy soft dried cranberries. Once you have taken one bite, there is no going back.

The aroma from these cookies, make them addictive! The smell of warm chocolate and toasted almonds mesmerise all your senses. Once you have made them, they will not survive the night.

Recipe:
1. In a large bowl, place 85g of cubed unsalted butter and 100g of caster sugar. Cream the mixture with a whisk, until it is pale. Then add 1 egg, 1 tsp of cinnamon, 50g of muscavado sugar and 2 tbsp of sunflower oil. Mix until smooth.
2. Then sieve 200g of plain flour and 1/2tsp of baking powder into your butter mixture. Mix the ingredients together until it forms a dough. At this point, you might assume that there is not enough flour because the mixture is quite sticky. However, this is the texture you are aiming for.
3. Now add a small handful of rolled oats, 50g of chopped dark chocolate, 30g of raisins and dried cranberries and a large handful of toasted almonds.
4. Roughly mix with your hands until the ingredients are incorporated into the dough.
5. Preheat the oven to 200C and prepare a heavy baking tray.
6. Place 1tbsp of your cookie dough into your hands and roll into a ball. Then flatten with the palm of your hand and place on the baking tray. Repeat step 6.
7. Make sure your cookies are spread apart so that they have room to grow. Once you have placed your cookies on a baking tray bake the cookies at 200C for 15 mins or until golden around the edges.
8. Once the cookies are cooked place them carefully on a wire rack by using a spatula.
9. Allow them to cool for 10 mins. This gives the cookies time to get that crunchy exterior and allow the inside to become chewy and delicious.

10. Enjoy with a strawberry smoothie, its the perfect combination and the most satisfying midnight snack!!

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