Loaded with crunchy almonds, big hunks of melty chocolate, and a light sprinkling of sea salt on top, these are the perfect sweet treat you’ve been looking for!
A quick disclaimer: these are good, old-fashioned cookies made with white flour and refined sugar. I usually try to stay away from processed ingredients, and have made cookies before that don’t use these ingredients (like my spicy ginger date cookies and orange chai spice cookies). But sometimes guys, you just need a regular ol’ cookie (I love food way too much to give up anything completely! Read more about my real food/diet philosophy here.). And sometimes, you just need a good old fashioned cookie straight out of the oven with a glass of milk before going to bed. Which is exactly what happened last night with these :-) Here’s an awesome trick that my mother taught me for how to mix cookie batter using only one bowl (it’s the only way I ever make cookies!).
Usually, cookie recipes will instruct you to mix the wet ingredients in one bowl, the dry in another, and then mix them both together. The way I do it is I mix the wet ingredients together (butter, sugar, vanilla, and eggs). Then, mix the small amounts of dry ingredients (spices, baking powder or soda, salt). This ensures that these ingredients will be equally distributed throughout the dough, without over-mixing the flour and therefore making the cookies tough. Now, you can add the flour and mix until just combined, folding in the chocolate chunks and nuts at the very end. Perfect, every time! I was in a hurry for cookies, so I did not chill the dough before baking them. As a result, these came out fairly thin. If you want a “chunkier” cookie, refrigerate the dough for at least an hour (and as long as overnight) before dropping them onto the baking sheet to cook.
Speaking of baking sheets, I just got this Nordic Ware Aluminum Baker’s Half Sheet a few months ago and I LOVE IT. It distributes heat so evenly and nothing ever sticks to it (though I did use parchment paper for these cookies!). You can even make an entire roast chicken and potatoes dinner on it, and use an oven-safe cooling rack inserted on top of it to cook bacon! I highly recommend one, if you don’t have one. This recipe is for a half batch of cookies, and makes about 2 dozed medium-sized cookies. If you need more, just double it! Enjoy your salty-sweet fix :-)
