Hot Cocoa Cookies

How is it Thanksgiving week already?! In spirit of the feast week, I’ve busted out with my fat pants and have commenced holiday pre-gaming.

This recipe is not for plain chocolate chip cookies (although one can never have enough chocolate chip recipes). It’s a spin-off of the OG recipe created by the modern baking queen herself, Christina Tosi. She’s the rock star behind Momofuku’s Milk Bar (dubbed “One of the most exciting bakeries in the country” by Bon Appetit Magazine). She’s a fave of Martha and Oprah. She has written a couple of groundbreaking cook books also.

Foodie crush posted a sea salt riff on this recipe. That’s next on my hit list, because I love all things sweet & salty.

The recipe in this blog post is my interpretation of her chocolate chip cookies. I subbed in dry hot cocoa mix for evaporated milk and added some instant coffee grounds for some complexity and a dash of jolly-ness. I also omitted the baking soda and salt by accident possibly because of the circus act happening in my kitchen at the time. I used salted butter (gasp) which is a major no-no in baking but I’m a rebel.

It was my mother-in-law’s birthday the other day and I made these to bring over to her house. The kids tried to help me bake. Dante was weaving a figure eight circling around my legs while I stirred and mixed. Max inhaled a half of a bag of chocolate chips and knocked over the bag of flour. It wasn’t pretty but the outcome was worth the chaos. And I used dark brown sugar instead of light because that’s all I had (desperate times call for desperate measures).

Ingredients

½ pound (2 sticks) salted butter, mostly melted and just warm to the touch
¾ cup packed dark brown sugar
½ cup granulated sugar
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour
1 packet of swiss miss hot cocoa mix (dry)
3/4 teaspoon Nestcafe instant coffee grounds crushed to a powder
½ teaspoon baking powder
10 ounces Ghirardelli dark chocolate chips

Directions

Heat the oven to 375. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper
In a large bowl, mix together the sugars and butter. Stir reeeeeally well (over 1 minute)
Mix in the egg and vanilla and mix really well again (about a minute or two) The batter should look glossy and begin to lighten in color a little
Mix in all of the dry ingredients (except for the chocolate chips) until just combined.
Fold in the chips
Using an ice cream scoop (!) drop dough onto baking sheet leaving at least 2″ between each. These are BOMBS. Huge. I fit six on each baking sheet.
Bake for about 10 minutes. Once the edges look golden brown, they’re done.

Let’s look one more time just because she’s a beaut.

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If this recipe looks yum, check out these other Milk Bar inspired recipes below!

Crack Pie