Double Choc Chip Cookies

These double choc chip cookies are the perfect addition to this year's baking bonanza. They are incredibly rich and chocolatey, soft and chewy, with crispy edges, and are great to put out with tea or coffee for visitors. I've made several batches of these, each trying a different rising agent/different cooking temperature/ratio between brown and caster sugar, and have finally found the (close to perfect) combination of ingredients.

My newfound tip for crispy edges: bake any cookies as per the instructions, and in the final minute, crank the oven an extra 20 degrees. This won't be long enough to further the cooking process of the cookie, but will very slightly burn the edges to make them nice and crispy. Crunchy edges on cookies remind me of the rolls of cookie dough my friend's parents would buy us in primary school for baking during sleepovers, except these particular cookies are bigger, softer, and contain perhaps an unnecessary amount of cocoa powder.

This recipe makes a dozen big cookies (around the same size as Subway cookies), but you could very easily use a teaspoon when measuring out the dough and make a larger quantity of smaller, bite sized biscuits. In this case, reduce cooking time by about 2 minutes.

Ingredients:

• 125g Butter, Softened

• 3/4 Cup Brown Sugar

• 1/4 Cup Caster Sugar

• 1 Egg

• 1 Tsp Vanilla Extract

• 1 Cup Plain Flour

• 1 Tsp Baking Powder

• 1/2 Cup Cocoa Powder

• 1 Cup Milk Chocolate Chips

Let's Bake These Cookies:

1. Pre heat oven to 170 degrees Celsius, fan forced, and line a tray with baking paper.

2. In a large mixing bowl, beat together butter and both sugars until soft and fluffy.

3. Add the egg and vanilla, and mix until incorporated.

4. Sift in the flour, baking powder, and cocoa powder and fold through. Be careful not to mix the dough too much once the flour has been added, as this will overwork the gluten and stop your cookies from being soft and chewy. Mix in the chocolate chips until evenly distributed.

5. Scoop the dough with one tablespoon and use another to roll into a ball. The dough is quite sticky so this is much cleaner than using your hands. Drop each ball onto the baking paper, leaving around 10cm between each one to allow for spreading room. Lightly flatten each ball with your fingers, just enough to give it a flat top.

6. Bake for 9 minutes on 170, then turn the heat up to 190 and cook for a further minute. This ensures a soft centre and crispy edge.

7. Allow cookies to cool slightly on baking tray before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

Store in an airtight container for up to 5 days, if they last that long.