These brown butter chocolate chip cookies first made an appearance here on the blog almost 6 years ago. I made them to celebrate my friend’s golden birthday and decided he deserved something a little more special than a traditional chocolate chip cookie.
After that, my love affair with brown butter started and now I very rarely make a chocolate chip cookie without it. Brown butter everything!
Now, my regular chocolate chip cookies are good. Before I put brown butter in anything, they were even declared the “best ever”. But these cookies? These are better. They are a favourite at work and among my friends and family. I’ve never met someone who didn’t like them.
Brown butter is a wonderful thing. It adds a whole new level of flavour and dimension to both baked goods and savoury items. It’s aromatic and gives items a slightly nutty taste. It is the perfect addition to chocolate chip cookies.
By browning the butter, you’re just elevating your cookie game. These cookies are a little crunchy around the edges, soft in the middle, and they have a slightly nutty, toasty taste that really pushes them over the edge and prevents the cookie from tasting too sweet.
Contrary to popular belief, we don’t want cookies that taste too sweet. At least I don’t.
When I originally made these cookies, I made them with mini chocolate chips because they are “cuter” than regular chocolate chips and stuff the cookies with “more chocolate flavour”
That’s changed too. Now, I almost exclusively use chopped chocolate or wafers/feves in my cookies as opposed to chocolate chips. Unlike chocolate chips, which retain their shape as they bake, these chocolates get gooey and melty as they bake, leaving rivers of chocolate throughout the cookie. It’s a chocolate dream and these are the cookies we all deserve.
Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
- 2 eggs
- 2 tsp. vanilla bean paste (or extract)
- 1 tsp. baking soda
- 1 tsp. salt
- 1/2 tsp. cream of tartar
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 8 oz. chopped chocolate
Instructions
- Brown the butter by melting over a medium heat. Let the butter foam and you will begin to see it change colour.
- Once you see brown milk solids at the bottom of your pan and smell a nutty aroma, remove from the heat and place in a bowl. Be sure to scrape out the sediment because that will give these cookies a nutty flavour. Set aside to cool slightly.
- Once cool, combine browned butter with both sugars in a mixing bowl and cream together. Add the eggs, one at a time, then the vanilla bean paste.
- Add baking soda, salt, cream of tartar and all-purpose flour, stirring to combine. Once dry ingredients have been incorporated, stir in the chopped chocolate.
- Place dough in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
- Remove dough from fridge and scoop onto parchment-lined baking sheets, spacing a couple of inches apart because cookies will spread during baking.
- Bake for 11-12 minutes then remove from oven. Allow cookies to sit on pan for a couple of minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.
Looking forward to trying these! What does the cream of tartar do?
It helps keep the cookies soft and contributes to the rustic look of the cookies. You can definitely leave it out though if you don’t have it.