- Joined
- Jun 22, 2017
- Messages
- 4,099
- Reaction score
- 2,087
that looks better, it probably could’ve been creamed a little bit more. But better slightly under creamed then over creamed. Let’s see how this one turns out
The Science Behind Chewy Cookies with Bread Flour
- Thread starter ToastedPine
- Start date
that looks better, it probably could’ve been creamed a little bit more. But better slightly under creamed then over creamed. Let’s see how this one turns out
In terms of looks - it’s not a significant difference from the last batch. I portion each 45g instead of 30g and I like the fact that it does not spread out as much as the over creamed one, and the centre gets compacted but in a nice way.
Tastes better.
But the glossy crackle skin that your cookie has is still eluding me.
Tastes better.
But the glossy crackle skin that your cookie has is still eluding me.
- Joined
- Jun 22, 2017
- Messages
- 4,099
- Reaction score
- 2,087
Ok, It does look much better. Try creaming a bit longer. I don’t want to shift any of percentages just yet. I think working your technique a bit might help. Your baking time looks look. You have nice maillard reaction on the bottom and edge—that’s what I like to see on a chocolate chip cookie. Nothing drives me more crazy than a pale chocolate chip cookie.
I’m creaming with hand mixer again with a slightly longer timing for 126g butter. About 3.5 minutes in total with the reserved 20% of sugar added towards the end.
Baking only 2 cookies on the quarter sheet.
I scooped 70g this time to see if I could closer mimic your cookie @Norcalbaker59.
Love the heft of it but realise that the longer cooking time is burning the bottom of the cookie. And baking at a higher shelf browns the top of the cookie too much. so I need to troubleshoot the temp and timing for 70g.
Froze them all overnight, but the cookies tend to melt/pool slightly to the sides when baking. Using conventional bake. No air circulation.
They are baked on parchment paper and nordicware naturals sheet pans. Taste is excellent of cos!
I had better end result when baking l the 42g cookies.
Baking only 2 cookies on the quarter sheet.
I scooped 70g this time to see if I could closer mimic your cookie @Norcalbaker59.
Love the heft of it but realise that the longer cooking time is burning the bottom of the cookie. And baking at a higher shelf browns the top of the cookie too much. so I need to troubleshoot the temp and timing for 70g.
Froze them all overnight, but the cookies tend to melt/pool slightly to the sides when baking. Using conventional bake. No air circulation.
They are baked on parchment paper and nordicware naturals sheet pans. Taste is excellent of cos!
I had better end result when baking l the 42g cookies.
- Joined
- Jun 22, 2017
- Messages
- 4,099
- Reaction score
- 2,087
The cookie looks excellent. I’m not sure why your top is not craggy since you’re doing everything correctly. It might be differences in cultivar of wheat, which unfortunately that cannot be remedied.
I don’t think it’s the small batch size.
Do you have a full size western style oven? If not then it’s probably going to be difficult to get a even bake on a large 70g cookie.
Baking is achieved with heated air. The air around heat element warms, then the warm Air displaces the cold air. Hot air rises, which forces cold air to the bottom of the oven chamber. The pan in the oven gets in the way of the air movement.
The smaller the oven, the less space for the air exchange to happen. Since a good exchange of heated air isn’t happening from bottom to top, it’s really hard to get a even bake in a small oven chamber. That makes it more difficult to evenly bake denser goods like a 70g cookie.
@Norcalbaker59 to hear you say that my cookie looks excellent - I can finally sleep tonight
Nope, I’m baking using a stovetop oven that’s 40liters/ about 40qt capacity. I’ll be trying out something between 45-70g to see if I can get a bigger cookie at an even bake.
Thanks for generously walking me through these batches of cookies and creaming.
Nope, I’m baking using a stovetop oven that’s 40liters/ about 40qt capacity. I’ll be trying out something between 45-70g to see if I can get a bigger cookie at an even bake.
Thanks for generously walking me through these batches of cookies and creaming.
- Joined
- Jun 22, 2017
- Messages
- 4,099
- Reaction score
- 2,087
Then I would stick with the smaller size cookies. They look very good. Do you have a beautiful caramelization on the edges, the top is a lovely golden. That’s a cookie I would definitely go for on a plate of cookies.
Thanks for generously walking me through these batches of cookies and creaming.
you’re very welcome
I’ll spend time making sure I can get those consistently good then.
I would have never realised that the size of the individual cookie would still be so dependent on my oven capacity for success if not for these test batches. Hope that others who check out this thread will be able to make a great cookie too.
- Joined
- Dec 31, 2020
- Messages
- 120
- Reaction score
- 111
You've inspired me @ShuBunny - I've made some cookie dough! Still no dairy-free chocolate in the house so I just made a dairy version and my husband and I will have to hide them from my toddler.
I followed a different recipe just because I found one that named specific British branded products and remember Norcal talking about how recipes don't always transfer across the pond, so took the brand-specifics as a good sign. Plus I happened to have all the items in my cupboards!
My recipe (omitting the brand names) was:
125g butter
115g light muscovado sugar
110g caster sugar
1 medium egg (I weighed mine and it was 48g)
1tsp vanilla extract
220g self raising flour
1/2 tsp salt
200g chocolate chips
Key points:
Recipe says to bake at 200C, which seems a bit high, for 7-10 minutes. But I'm very excited to give them a go tomorrow!
After creaming:
After egg:
Final mix: (the white lumps are chocolate chips)
I followed a different recipe just because I found one that named specific British branded products and remember Norcal talking about how recipes don't always transfer across the pond, so took the brand-specifics as a good sign. Plus I happened to have all the items in my cupboards!
My recipe (omitting the brand names) was:
125g butter
115g light muscovado sugar
110g caster sugar
1 medium egg (I weighed mine and it was 48g)
1tsp vanilla extract
220g self raising flour
1/2 tsp salt
200g chocolate chips
Key points:
- I actually used plain flour as I rarely use self-raising flour unless I'm making suet pastry or suet sponge. I think UK self-raising is different from US self-rising flour, but I added half a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda, which I think in US is baking soda.
- I creamed the butter and sugars when the butter was 50F - maybe too cold? Also my mixer kept squishing it to the bottom and I think Norcal has said before that if the quantities are too small, mixers will struggle. So not sure creaming was great but I have always creamed butter at room temperature before so I'm excited to use new knowledge.
- I chilled the egg - most people do not chill eggs in the UK.
- I sifted in the dry ingredients.
- Mixture never got above 65.5F.
Recipe says to bake at 200C, which seems a bit high, for 7-10 minutes. But I'm very excited to give them a go tomorrow!
After creaming:
After egg:
Final mix: (the white lumps are chocolate chips)
- Joined
- Dec 31, 2020
- Messages
- 120
- Reaction score
- 111
I just think my butter was very cold - maybe too cold. I cut the butter into cubes and put it on top of the sugar and it incorporated quite quickly. My kitchen is also 18C so not too warm, which helps.I am utterly jealous that your dough batter stays effortlessly cold after creaming
- Joined
- Dec 31, 2020
- Messages
- 120
- Reaction score
- 111
Okay, so I was particularly geeky and cooked different batches for different times and at different temperatures.
No ripple on the top like Norcal’s but, to be fair, cookies in the UK do tend to be sold with the cracked tops. The recipe was meant to emulate a Millie’s Cookies biscuit, which is pretty much the only national cookie chain I can think of here. And they do look very much like them. They come out of the oven slightly puffy then deflate to create the cracks.
Cookie 1 was too gooey in the middle and undercooked. Cookie 2 was less gooey but more soft all over, plus it went dark quite quickly, which you can’t really see in the photo. Cookie 3 looks good but took so long to get and colour that it was quite dry and crispy. Cookies 4 and 5 were the best, with 5 just having the edge. For 5, I just repeated cookie 1 but baked for longer. The edges were crisp and the insides gooey.
I was generally pretty pleased with the experiment and I got pretty good uniformity from 42g balls, slightly flattened on the bottom.
But my goodness they’re sweet! I haven’t made choc chip cookies in years and whilst there are many biscuits I could eat a whole packet of in one sitting, I can only manage one of these! I won’t be making these very often as it will take ages for us to get through them all but they are very much like the ones you’d buy here, though maybe not in the US - I have never had a bakery cookie when I’ve been in the US.
Oh, edit: I forgot I didn’t use all plain/AP flour as I remember Norcal saying UK plain flour is like US cake flour. I used 140g plain flour and 80g bread flour.
These are what Millie’s cookies look like:
No ripple on the top like Norcal’s but, to be fair, cookies in the UK do tend to be sold with the cracked tops. The recipe was meant to emulate a Millie’s Cookies biscuit, which is pretty much the only national cookie chain I can think of here. And they do look very much like them. They come out of the oven slightly puffy then deflate to create the cracks.
Cookie 1 was too gooey in the middle and undercooked. Cookie 2 was less gooey but more soft all over, plus it went dark quite quickly, which you can’t really see in the photo. Cookie 3 looks good but took so long to get and colour that it was quite dry and crispy. Cookies 4 and 5 were the best, with 5 just having the edge. For 5, I just repeated cookie 1 but baked for longer. The edges were crisp and the insides gooey.
I was generally pretty pleased with the experiment and I got pretty good uniformity from 42g balls, slightly flattened on the bottom.
But my goodness they’re sweet! I haven’t made choc chip cookies in years and whilst there are many biscuits I could eat a whole packet of in one sitting, I can only manage one of these! I won’t be making these very often as it will take ages for us to get through them all but they are very much like the ones you’d buy here, though maybe not in the US - I have never had a bakery cookie when I’ve been in the US.
Oh, edit: I forgot I didn’t use all plain/AP flour as I remember Norcal saying UK plain flour is like US cake flour. I used 140g plain flour and 80g bread flour.
These are what Millie’s cookies look like:
Last edited:
- Joined
- Jun 22, 2017
- Messages
- 4,099
- Reaction score
- 2,087
@Emmie I have to say your cookies look amazing. Even before I read your write up, I picked #5. IMO it looks better than bakery cookie. If I saw that cookie on a platter next to theirs I‘d pick your cookie.
It has all the telltale signs of a great cookie: craggy top, visible Maillard reaction, uniform shape in circumference and even distribution of dough throughout, nice rounded edge, not too thick or thin.
Sweetness is always one of my pet peeve‘s with cookies. Air percentage of 102% sugars to flour is very typical of a chocolate chip cookie. I generally drop it down to 95% sugars. I also use semi sweet chocolate or Valrhona 70% rather than milk chocolate. I rarely ever use compound chocolate; if I use a chip it is actually chocolate callets. Semi sweet chocolate and Valrhona 70% are less sweet. They also give more complexity to the cookie. Real chocolate will melt into the dough, so the cookie mouth feel is different, I think much better. I’m not a fan of compound chocolate with the vegetable that in place of cocoa butter and the extra sugar. It is too sweet and it does not melt into the cookie.
“Oh, edit: I forgot I didn’t use all plain/AP flour as I remember Norcal saying UK plain flour is like US cake flour. I used 140g plain flour and 80g bread flour.”
Now you’re thinking like a baker!
It has all the telltale signs of a great cookie: craggy top, visible Maillard reaction, uniform shape in circumference and even distribution of dough throughout, nice rounded edge, not too thick or thin.
Sweetness is always one of my pet peeve‘s with cookies. Air percentage of 102% sugars to flour is very typical of a chocolate chip cookie. I generally drop it down to 95% sugars. I also use semi sweet chocolate or Valrhona 70% rather than milk chocolate. I rarely ever use compound chocolate; if I use a chip it is actually chocolate callets. Semi sweet chocolate and Valrhona 70% are less sweet. They also give more complexity to the cookie. Real chocolate will melt into the dough, so the cookie mouth feel is different, I think much better. I’m not a fan of compound chocolate with the vegetable that in place of cocoa butter and the extra sugar. It is too sweet and it does not melt into the cookie.
“Oh, edit: I forgot I didn’t use all plain/AP flour as I remember Norcal saying UK plain flour is like US cake flour. I used 140g plain flour and 80g bread flour.”
Now you’re thinking like a baker!
- Joined
- Dec 31, 2020
- Messages
- 120
- Reaction score
- 111
Oh wow, Norcal, that is a compliment, thank you! Yes I think I'd definitely reduce the sugar a touch next time. I used a combo of white and milk chocolate chips as that's what I had in the cupboard. I've checked the ingredients and, interestingly, the milk chips are regular chocolate, whereas the white ones have added oil so I guess are the compound type you mention. I had to google callets, but now I've seen them I know what they are! You can only get them in specialist shops but I imagine the taste is much better than grocery store chocolate chips and great for melting chocolate for tempering.
Being British, I do love a biscuit with a cup of tea, but the only biscuits I've baked in forever are shortbread and speculaas biscuits, which are obviously very different from big squidgy cookies. Oh, and my Jammie Dodgers, of course.
But I really enjoyed making them as it's so convenient take a bit of the dough out of the fridge or freezer and bake a few. I might think about making some more - but not cookies as they definitely don't go with tea! Thanks again Norcal for so generously giving your time and advice.
- Joined
- Dec 31, 2020
- Messages
- 120
- Reaction score
- 111
No, thank YOU for inspiring me to get back to baking biscuits. I'm really loving working on improving my bread at the moment, but it was so nice to mix it up, especially as my bread didn't go as I wished yesterday.
I agree with Norcalbaker, #5 looks picture perfect with that uniformly cracked top. And I'll also corroborate that the key to decreasing sweetness is using darker chocolates; 70% is definitely a good place to start. You can also try increasing the salt in the dough by a bit or sprinkling a small amount of flaky sea salt on the cookies before or after baking. I've no idea how people eat chocolate chip cookies with milk chocolate - that's just overwhelmingly sweet even for me, and I have a high tolerance for sweetness.
- Joined
- Jun 22, 2017
- Messages
- 4,099
- Reaction score
- 2,087
Oh wow, Norcal, that is a compliment, thank you! Yes I think I'd definitely reduce the sugar a touch next time. I used a combo of white and milk chocolate chips as that's what I had in the cupboard. I've checked the ingredients and, interestingly, the milk chips are regular chocolate, whereas the white ones have added oil so I guess are the compound type you mention. I had to google callets, but now I've seen them I know what they are! You can only get them in specialist shops but I imagine the taste is much better than grocery store chocolate chips and great for melting chocolate for tempering.
Being British, I do love a biscuit with a cup of tea, but the only biscuits I've baked in forever are shortbread and speculaas biscuits, which are obviously very different from big squidgy cookies. Oh, and my Jammie Dodgers, of course.
You don’t want to go too low so as not to undermine the structure of the dough, but you can definitely lower it. My family is Japanese, so our family and friends don’t eat super sweet desserts. When I bake for others, I have to increase the sugar back to the American palate.
Back in 2013 I did blind taste test with chocolate chip cookies. Americans talk about their love of chocolate, but I found they could not handle good quality chocolate like Valrhona 70%. The children of course preferred the sweeter cookies. They preferred the common grocery store Nestle milk chocolate chip. The adults liked Ghirardelli, an American dark semi sweet chocolate chip. The Callebaut 60% dark chocolate in a block that I chopped came in second place with the adults. And everyone hands down rejected the French Valrhona 70% dark chocolate callets. I prefer the Valrhona callets in my cookies. I love the rich not to sweet chocolate, and the way the chopped chunks creates puddles on melted chocolate thoughout the cookie.
I miss the days of eating gluten. The shortbread and speculaas were my type of cookie. I’ve made gluten free shortbread, but it’s not the same.
- Joined
- Jun 22, 2017
- Messages
- 4,099
- Reaction score
- 2,087
Oh sprinkling salt on top is a good idea. I have two sons, they are like night and day. One is savory, the other is sweet. I made a batch of chocolate chunk cookies and sprinkled my favorite Maldron salt on half the batch.
Oldest son said, “yuck, mom, don’t do that again!”
Youngest son said, “dang, mom that’s the best cookie you’ve made yet!”