Today’s Exercise Includes Camera Work!
Today, we’ll take be taking a walk around our city neighbourhood and taking black and white photographs of this year’s very different holiday scene. Then, we’ll come home and bake up a batch or two of cookies we stashed in the freezer last week. [Below, you’ll find a list of SSJ’s favourite freeze-ahead cookies!] Served with a hot chocolate or a hot toddy, perhaps!
SSJ’S VERY BEST FREEZE-AHEAD COOKIES
Reverse Chip Brookie Cookies
Servings: 36
Ingredients
Brownie Batter
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter
- 2 tbs cream cheese [or more butter]
- 1 c brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 tbs vanilla
- 3 oz unsweetened chocolate melted and cooled [or .5 c dutch processed cocoa]
- 2 1/4 c flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 1/2 c [one 226 g bag] white chocolate chips or chunks [substitute dark semi-sweet or peanut-butter chips or chunks if desired]
- [Or go “nuts’ by adding 1 c chips and 1/2 c chopped walnuts or macadamias]
Cookie Batter
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter
- 2 tbs cream cheese [or more butter]
- 1 c brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 tbs vanilla
- 1 tbs molasses [optional]
- 2 1/4 c flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 1/2 c semi-sweet chocolate chips or chunks
- [Or go “nuts” by adding 1 c chips and 1/2 c chopped pecans or walnuts]
Instructions
Make Brownie Batter
- In a mixer or by hand, beat butter, cream cheese [or more butter] and sugar until fluffy.
- Add egg and vanilla and beat to incorporate.
- Add cooled melted chocolate [or cocoa powder] and beat to incorporate.
- Sift in flour [1 1/2 c to start if using cocoa powder], soda, and salt and mix to combine.
- [If using cocoa powder, add additional flour by the quarter cup until dough becomes firm]
- Add chips or chunks [and nuts] and combine.
- Place brownie batter in refrigerator or freezer while making the chocolate chip batter below.
Make Chocolate Chip Cookie Batter
- In a mixer or by hand, beat butter, cream cheese [or more butter] and sugars until fluffy.
- Add egg and vanilla and beat to incorporate.
- Add molasses and beat to incorporate.
- Sift in flour, soda, and salt and mix to combine.
- Add chips or chunks [and nuts] and combine.
- If your house is warm or if the batter is soft, refrigerate for 30 minutes or freeze for 15.
Combine and Bake
- Heat oven to 350.
- Line baking sheets with parchment or silpat.
- Portion the chocolate chip batter into 2-3 dozen 1- in spheres and refrigerate while working on the brownie batter.
- Portion the brownie batter into 2-3 dozen 1-inch spheres and refrigerate if necessary.
- [You may end up with more spheres of one batter than the other. We had 3 extra balls of chocolate chip dough. You know what you can do with those…]
- Smash one chocolate chip and one brownie sphere together at a time. *
- Place brookie cookie spheres a few inches apart on baking tray.
- Press cookies down fairly flat.
- Bake cookies for 10-13 minutes. [Ours baked for 11 minutes and were just soft enough.]
- Bake only until edges are set and cookie middles have just begun to set.
- Cool cookies on the pan for 3-5 minutes.
- Cool cookies completely [or almost completely..] on wire racks.
Notes
*FREEZE AHEAD! These cookies make great freeze-ahead cookies! After smashing the chocolate and brownie spheres into one another and forming into a sphere, place the cookies in a single layer on a piece of waxed paper or parchment [or stack multiple flat layers] in a Ziploc-style bag or freezer safe-container and freeze. I find it best to place my a Ziploc-style bag on a tray until the flat-lay packages are fully frozen. No need to defrost. Simply bake 2-5 minutes longer than the time called for in the recipe.
Santa Babies
Servings: 45 Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 c unsalted butter softened
- 1 c brown sugar
- 1/2 c granulated sugar
- 2 eggs room temperature
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 2 c all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 c oats
- 1 1/2 c semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 3/4 c toffee bits or 4 skor bars crushed
- 1/2 c flaked coconut [sweetened or unsweetened]
- 1/2 c chopped pecans [If you have nut allergies you can leave these out, and the recipe will be just as good.]
Instructions
- Heat oven to 350.
- Cream butter and sugar until fluffy.
- Add eggs and vanilla and mix until creamy.
- Separately, mix flour, salt and baking soda.
- Add these dry ingredients to the wet ingredients.
- Separately, mix chocolate chips, toffee bits, oatmeal, coconut and pecans.
- Add as many of these mixins to the cookie batter as you can, mixing first by machine, then, fully incorporating with a spatula. The dough will be very stiff and bursting with mixins.
- Drop 1-2 tbs of dough 2 inches apart on parchment or silpat-lined cookie sheets.*
- Bake for 10-12 minutes.
- Cool on wire racks.
- Enjoy!
Notes
*FREEZE AHEAD! These cookies make great freeze-ahead cookies! Form the dough into balls & place the cookies in a single layer on a piece of waxed paper or parchment [or stack multiple flat layers] in a Ziploc-style bag or freezer safe-container and freeze. I find it best to place my a Ziploc-style bag on a tray until the flat-lay packages are fully frozen. No need to defrost. Simply bake 2-5 minutes longer than the time called for in the recipe.
SSJ’s Classic Chocolate Chip Cookies
Servings: 5 Dozen
Ingredients
- 2 ¼ c all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 c unsalted butter [room temperature]
- ¾ c white sugar
- ¾ c brown sugar [packed]
- 1 ½ tsp vanilla
- 2 eggs
- 2 c semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 1 c chopped walnuts [optional]
- 1 tsp cinnamon [optional]
Instructions
- Heat oven to 375 F and line two cookie sheets with parchment or silpat.
- Combine the flour, baking soda, and salt in a small bowl.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, with a hand mixer, or by hand, beat the butter and sugar together until they are creamy.
- Add the eggs one at a time, beating until well combined.
- Add the vanilla and beat until just combined.
- Beat in the flour mixture by the ½ cup or thereabouts until combined.
- Stir in the chocolate chips.
- [If desired, stir in the nuts and cinnamon.] *
- Drop by rounded tablespoon onto lined cookie sheets.**
- Bake for 9-11 minutes, or until the edges are just golden brown.
- Allow the cookies to remain on the sheet for 2 minutes before removing to wire racks and cooling completely.
Notes
* We only tend to add the cinnamon when adding nuts to the cookies. Do as you please
**FREEZE AHEAD! These cookies make great freeze-ahead cookies! Simply form the dough into tablespoon-sized balls, place the cookies in a single layer on a piece of waxed paper or parchment [or stack multiple flat layers] in a Ziploc-style bag or freezer safe-container and freeze. I find it best to place my a Ziploc-style bag on a tray until the flat-lay packages are fully frozen. No need to defrost. Simply bake 2-5 minutes longer than the time called for in the recipe.
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