Magical, Marvelous, Memorable Cookies

My favorite cookie in general is still the thick and soft sugar cookie, but I still do have a special place for a good chocolate chip one.

Whether just you’re baking it, just eating it, or baking it AND eating it, I  think all of us are more are less on the search for the perfect chocolate chip cookie. I know I am. And as a result, I’ve made a lot of different recipes, many of them claiming to be ‘THE’ one. Some of them actually are VERY good. Some of them…need work.

I decided that the 12 Days of Christmas was as good a time as any to try out a new chocolate chip cookie recipe that I’ve had pinned for a while. Food 52 is almost always a good source for great recipes in my experience and the name alone was attention-grabbing enough. I had to see what all the ‘hype’ was about.

Now that all is said and done, I guess I can now give my own honest review.

I can honestly say I’ve never made cookies like this before.

Don’t get me wrong: I actually mean that in a VERY good way.

In a nutshell, the cookies are good. They are however, VERY different than what I had initially expected, and what I think most of us are expecting when we first bite into a chocolate chip cookie.

Should you choose to make this recipe for yourself (and I recommend that you do), I’ll try to give a brief description of how mine turned out just so that you don’t think you somehow did something wrong when these cookies don’t puff up thick and chewy in the oven….because they won’t. At all.

A florentine is typically thought of as a French biscuit/cookie made with either/and nuts, candied fruit, butter and honey. There’s a very low flour ratio to the recipe, as the cookie is meant to be made quite crisp by the crystallizing of the high sugar content in the cookie as it bakes. They come out VERY thin, either to the point of chewiness, or crispness depending on how long you bake them.

Interestingly enough, florentines have been a recipe I’ve been thus far, too intimidated to try out yet. I’m concerned that because they do bake up so thin, and there is such a high sugar content in the biscuit, I’ll end up burning them or they won’t be the right consistency, etc. So, I’ve stayed away from florentine-making.

Then I made these cookies.

I wasn’t super worried when I saw that this dough spread a lot in the oven, as the recipe tells you ahead of time that they will, even after chilling. But I was a little surprised that they spread to the extent that they did although when you consider the flour to sugar ratio in the recipe, it should kinda be a given. I finally threw up my hands and said that they’d turn out how they turned out and that was all there was to it.

I took the first batch out of the oven, let them cool a little bit, then broke off a piece of one to sample.

Then I had to laugh and literally say out loud to myself, “It’s a chocolate chip florentine.”

That seriously is the best way I can describe these cookies, guys. If all the flavors of a chocolate chip cookie wanted to cram themselves into a florentine biscuit, that’s what this would taste like.

And I do have to say, it’s very good.

You don’t miss the amount of flour or the typical ‘cakeyness’ you normally expect in a chocolate chip cookie recipe here at all. All the various other ingredients do more than enough to give contrast textures in the dough. I used chocolate chunks, crushed pretzels and Kashi Go Lean Crunch as my combo, but the recipe does encourage you to experiment with other fill-ins if that trio isn’t to your liking.

The sugar in the cookie thins, and subsequently almost caramelizes the dough so that it has an initial snap at first bite that gives way to a pleasant chewiness that still retains a sugary crunch.

If you like thin and/or chewy cookies as a rule, you will absolutely LOVE these cookies. And even if you’re like me and tend to think that you don’t like thin and crispy/chewy chocolate chip cookies…chances are you’re still gonna go for these. You just will.

Maybe that’s what makes them Magical, Memorable and Marvelous.

Cheers to us all at the Fiesta Friday #99 Christmas bash, cohosted this week by  Caroline @ Caroline’s Cooking and Linda @ La Petite Paniere.

Day 1: Springerle Cookies

Day 2: Speculaas Cookies

Day 3: Gingerbread Caramel Crunch

Day 4: Cranberry Pumpkin Gingerbread

Day 5: Sticky Caramel Pecan Babka

Day 6: Speculoos Truffle Cookies

Day 7: Aniseed Cookies

Day 8: Magical, Memorable, Marvelous Cookies

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