11 Ways Celebrity Chefs Upgrade A Classic Chocolate Chip Cookie
One recipe that many beginner bakers learn to make is chocolate chip cookies. Although fairly simple to make, there are a ton of ways home chefs can take this treat to the next level. Oftentimes, researching different tips and tricks to perfecting the chocolate chip cookie involves a quick Google search and clicking on the first recipe you see. But why not turn to the experts to see what they have to say?
Celebrity chefs have more than a few tricks up their sleeves when making chocolate chip cookies. From picking the best chocolate possible to sneaking secret ingredients into the dough, it does not take all that much effort to bring your cookies from good to great. The next time you feel the urge to whip out your stand mixer and make a batch of cookies for you or your friends, make sure to keep these wise words of advice in mind.
1. Jacques Torres: Use 60% dark chocolate
Celebrity pastry chef Jacques Torres knows a thing or two when it comes to chocolate. The cook originally hails from France and has been working in the food industry since the age of 15. Torres is known across the globe as "Mr. Chocolate" and is widely known by fans as a judge on the hit Netflix baking competition series, "Nailed It." But, having been in the industry for so long, Torres' career clearly started far before the first episode of "Nailed It." When the celebrity chef has tips to share when it comes to chocolate chip cookies, it's time to pay attention.
While many home chefs may reach for the first bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips they find at the grocery store when preparing to bake cookies, Torres has a very specific recommendation in this department. On YouTube, he explains that his famous chocolate chip cookies use 60% Belgium dark chocolate. He also makes sure to use chocolate chips, rather than discs, that will melt nicely and create a layering effect within the cookie.
2. Joanne Chang: Don't skip the step of creaming your butter and sugar
The process of making chocolate chip cookies from scratch involves mixing various wet and dry ingredients together to create a dough that is then scooped into individual portions. But before beginners can have a bowl of cookie dough ready for baking, they need to master the simple-yet-critical steps of combining everything. It sounds easy, but some expert-level steps will make a world of a difference in the end result. Celebrity chef Joanne Chang stresses the importance of creaming your butter and sugar together on YouTube.
Creaming your butter and sugar simply means mixing them together. Usually, people employ the use of an electric stand mixer, as this process can take several minutes and can be tiring to do by hand. In order to do this, Chang suggests having unsalted sticks of butter at room temperature that are soft enough that you can bend them with ease. Next, combine the butter with a blend of white and brown sugar, mixing them together in your stand mixer for roughly five minutes, until the contents change to light brown. Why is this step so important? According to Chang, the sugar crystals essentially aerate the butter, which allows the creamed mixture to become light and fluffy, leading to cookies with a satisfying texture.
3. Martha Stewart: Use an ice cream scoop so your dough bakes evenly
When baking chocolate chip cookies, you want to create less work for yourself, not more. Making these sweet treats is fairly simple, though a couple of common missteps can easily lead you astray. One classic misstep is placing differently-sized portions of cookie dough into the oven. This should be avoided because, when you pull your baking sheet out of the oven, you'll find that some cookies are undercooked, while others are overcooked. The solution to this problem can be found in celebrity chef and queen of all things baking Martha Stewart.
In a video on YouTube, Stewart suggests that when it is time to form your cookie dough into individually-sized portions, you want to use an ice cream scoop. You will want to make sure that you have an ice cream scoop that comes with a built-in level, which automatically scrapes the dough out of the scoop for you. The ice cream scoop keeps your setup nice and tidy and also helps ensure that your cookies are evenly shaped. This will help your cookies bake at the same rate, so when they are finished, each one is perfect and ready to eat.
4. Giada De Laurentiis: Make three different kinds of cookies using the same dough
The classic chocolate chip cookie is a crowd-pleaser, which is why it's such a beloved recipe that not too many beginner bakers choose to mess around with. But if you want to mix things up, you may feel inspired to experiment with different flavors and ingredients to bake a batch of more unique chocolate chip cookies. The problem, however, is figuring out how to do this without having to start over completely each time. Celebrity chef Giada De Laurentiis has a great trick on how to make different kinds of cookies easily, which she shares in a YouTube video.
Say you want a chocolate chip cookie, but you also want to make mint chocolate chip, as well as a chocolate chip cookie with nuts. All you need to do is create a large enough base dough for all three kinds of cookies, then separate it into three different mixing bowls. From there, you can add your different flavorings, nuts, and whatever you wish to use.
For a method that uses a little less dishware, you can keep the dough in a single bowl. Once your first batch of cookies is scooped, you can add your second ingredient, for example, walnuts. After removing the amount of walnut cookie dough you want to bake, you can then make your third batch, using additional mix-ins.
5. Alton Brown: Use melted butter and bread flour instead of soft butter and regular flour
Most of the time, chocolate chip cookies will look almost identical from one batch to the next. Whether you prefer your cookies to be crispy or soft, the process typically involves mixing flour, sugar, butter, eggs, and so on, together. But there are a few hacks you can pick up from celebrity chefs if you want to experiment with different ingredients to yield mind-blowing chocolate chip cookies. When it comes to celebrity chef cooking tips, many turn to Alton Brown. The food media personality has appeared on several Food Network programs over the years.
On YouTube, Brown shares a secret for achieving ultra-chewy cookies. This solution may seem a bit sacriligeous to those more familiar with baking desserts. Instead of using softened butter and all-purpose flour, as other chefs may suggest, Brown uses melted butter and bread flour. The reason behind this combination is that it's designed to make extra glutinous — and therefore chewier — cookies. Since bread flour is great at absorbing and maintaining moisture, your cookies will likely come out more moist as well.
6. Andrew Zimmern: Add corn syrup for super-chewy cookies
You may know Andrew Zimmern best from his hit television series "Bizarre Foods," in which he travels the globe trying some of the most adventurous meals you've ever seen. But Zimmern is also knowledgeable about dishes familiar to us, including chocolate chip cookies. While watching him bake on YouTube, beginner bakers will likely recognize most of the ingredients as standard building blocks for the perfect chocolate chip cookies. However, Zimmern also adds corn syrup to his batter.
Zimmern notes that the multiple sweeteners are intentional, noting in the video: "The sugars melt, caramelize, and provide crispness." To counteract that, "The corn syrup makes sure there's the chewiness," Zimmern says. It's not every day you see corn syrup added to a batch of cookie dough, but if you like your cookies to come out extra chewy, you may want to consider employing Zimmern's chocolate cookie tip.
7. Valerie Bertinelli: Add toffee bits and walnuts for added crunch
Some people have strong opinions on what makes a chocolate chip cookie great. Some may argue that it comes down to what kind of chocolate you use in the batter, while others strongly prefer one kind of texture over the other. If you are particular about your texture, then you probably prefer one of two options: a soft cookie or a crunchy cookie. If you like a little bit of crunch, there are certain things you can do in the baking process to enhance this texture, like using white sugar rather than brown sugar, or a higher proportion of white sugar. You can also add crunch-enhancing ingredients, as Valerie Bertinelli suggests on YouTube.
Bertinelli does not just mix chocolate chips into her cookies: she also adds toffee bits and walnuts. She specifically chooses toffee bits because, as she explains, "Toffee is basically butter and sugar that's been cooked down ... it's got this beautiful crackle to it. So when these go into the cookie, you're just adding more butter and more sugar. What could be wrong with that?" Those, in combination with chopped walnuts, will give each bite of your cookie an added crunch.
8. Ree Drummond: Chop up baking chocolate for a smoother finish
If anyone out there can point home cooks in the direction of mastering comfort food, it's Ree Drummond. Known for her popular television series "The Pioneer Woman," Drummond has been bringing homestyle recipes to living rooms across the country for years. Because no meal is complete without dessert, Drummond also lends her expertise to sweets, including chocolate chip cookies. Drummond's tip for baking the best chocolate chip cookie possible involves picking chocolate that will easily melt in the oven.
Drummond advises avoiding chocolate chips altogether to elevate your cookies to the next level. Instead, Drummond shares in a video on YouTube how she incorporates baking chocolate into her cookies. Baking chocolate is chocolate that is usually unsweetened, or at least contains less sugar and processing than chocolate chips. It usually comes in the form of a chocolate bar. As Drummond explains, baking chocolate melts much more easily, too, making it ideal for adding a smooth and creamy finish to your cookies. Her personal preference is to use a mixture of semi-sweet and dark chocolate.
9. Ina Garten: Use white chocolate
There is a reason chocolate chip cookies are so popular. But it's easy to get bored with any recipe, even your favorite ones. Sometimes, baking a more exciting chocolate chip cookie requires simply changing the flavors. Celebrity chef Ina Garten, known for her show "Barefoot Contessa," suggests doing as much in a YouTube video.
Garten's secret is her Chocolate White Chocolate Chunk Cookies. The best part is that switching from a garden-variety chocolate chip cookie to Garten's special cookies only involves a couple of simple substitutions. It all starts with adding unsweetened cocoa powder into your batter when making the dough. This turns your dough from basic to chocolate-flavored. Then, instead of semi-sweet, milk, or dark chocolate, Garten opts for blocks of white chocolate, which she cuts into large chunks. Once you learn the basic building blocks of making chocolate chip cookies, it becomes much easier to improvise and make enticing new flavor changes like Garten's.
10. Giada De Laurentiis: Make cookies using cake mix
To make chocolate chip cookies, you will need to combine varying amounts of flour, sugar, eggs, butter, and so on. The basic components of cookies are largely the same, and deviating too far from the standard list of ingredients could have your dessert coming out entirely different than what you would expect a cookie to look like. However, sometimes a happy accident occurs. Following the spirit of improvisation, celebrity chef Giada De Laurentiis suggests turning to a different baking mixture entirely when making your cookies.
While making cookies on YouTube with her daughter, De Laurentiis experiments with using cake mix instead of the standard cookie dough. To achieve this, you could either make your cake mix from scratch or buy a boxed mixture at the store for a quicker baking process. De Laurentiis admits that the results are a little messier than a typical chocolate chip cookie and that they may fall apart, but there was no denying that this is one tasty substitution.
11. Paul Hollywood: Pop extra chocolate in the middle of the cookie for ultimate gooeyness
If there is any television program that aspiring bakers know about these days, it's "The Great British Bake Off." The comforting show brings a group of contestants together under a charming tent in the quaint English countryside for a series of baking challenges. The show has gone on for several seasons since it first debuted in 2010, largely thanks to judges like Paul Hollywood.
Hollywood appeared in a YouTube video for Wired with "The Great British Bake Off" co-host Prue Leith to answer questions sent in by viewers about all things baking. The topics touched on baked goods of all kinds, including chocolate chip cookies. When one viewer asked how to prevent their cookies from coming out too hard, Hollywood suggested adding additional chocolate to the cookie as it sets. Simply use your finger to make a small indent, pop in a small piece of chocolate, and reseal. "With that extra bit of chocolate on the inside, when you break it open, the gooiness of the chocolate will just fall out, and it's delicious," says Hollywood.