Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Post #96: Serendipity Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

From Chocolate Chip Bars

 
Okay, seriously, I absolutely love to try new recipes, especially when they are ones that I know my family will eat!

Well, today, I was going to bake a batch of cookies using a new recipe from Our Best Bites. It is one of my favorite new blogs. Go over there a take a gander if you have not done so already and you will see what I mean. They have a wonderful site! It always has great recipes, great pictures, and awesome goodies!

So, I tried this recipe that they posted:

Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
Adapted from Cooks Illustrated
www.ourbestbites.com
2 C plus 2 T flour
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
12 T butter (1 1/2 sticks) melted and cooled until warm
1 cup brown sugar (light or dark)
1/2 C granulated sugar
1 large egg + 1 egg yolk
2 t vanilla extract
1 1/2 C semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate chips
Heat oven to 325 degrees. Adjust oven racks to upper- and lower- middle positions. Mix flour, salt, and baking soda together in medium bowl; set aside.
Either by hand or with electric mixer, mix butter and sugars until thoroughly blended. Mix in egg, yolk, and vanilla. Add dry ingredients; mix until just combined. Stir in chips.
Shape with a standard sized cookie scoop and place on a parchment-lined cookie sheet (or a silpat). Bake until cookies are light golden brown and outer edges start to harden yet centers are still soft and puffy, 10-13 minutes. Cool cookies on cookie sheets. Serve or store in airtight container.


I thought I followed the recipe as directed, but I think my definition of "warm" was a bit off and maybe, just maybe, I was in a bit of a hurry. I did want to mail these little bites of awesomeness to my nieces and nephew. However, it was not meant to be. I must have used the butter while it was warmer than warm and it made my dough look gooey!

Which brings me to something I love even more than trying new recipes and that is salvaging a messed up attempt at one!

So here is what you can do if you use overly-warm butter for the above recipe and come up with gLobbily goo:

(continue from above recipe where you left off, which was looking increduosly at a  glob of cookie dough, and raise the oven temperature to 350F)

  • Spread the gooey batter into a well-buttered rimmed baking sheet, making sure to coat the sides
  • Then, pour batter evenly in baking pan, spreading with the back of a spoon, if necessary (for me it was)
  • Bake at 350F for 20 minutes (top of batter will just start looking brown)
  • Then, remove pan from oven
  • Sprinkle about 6 oz of mini chocolate chips of your choice evenly on top, then place back into oven
  • Further bake the cookie dough for another 2-4 minutes, until the chips melt enough to spread
  • Remove pan from oven
  • Spread softened chips with the back of a spoon until a nice even layer coats the dough's surface
  • Place additional toppings such as nuts, toffee, or additional chocolates and candies, and press into melted chocolate coating
  • allow dough to cool
  • Cut into individual bars
My family just loved these. They did have a cookie-cake texture and were soft and chewy. I just knew if I had tried to use this dough for the cookies, they would have come out flattened and awful, but using the batter in a brownie-style method worked! Thank goodness, I hate to waste good products! Believe me, I have had more than my fair share of "straight from the oven into the trash" can moments.
I would also like to give credit to Dorie Greenspan. I used many of her ideas from her Caramel Crunch Bars recipe.


So here is what to do when you do what not to do!

8 comments:

Barbara Bakes said...

These look delicious - great save - I think I prefer bar cookies anyway.

Anonymous said...

What a great solution. The bars look yummy.

Anonymous said...

Yum! These bar cookies look fantastic!

Jennifer said...

That looks really tasty, good save! I am thinking of making cookies today!

Unknown said...

I am a cookie bar kind of girl! These look amazing!!

Shari said...

Great recovery info! They look delicious.

Debbie said...

Fabulous! I love being able to salvage kitchen errors.

Sara @ Our Best Bites said...

look at you- what a great idea! I still wonder why your dough turned out gooey, it must have been hot butter because it shouldn't do that! I'm so glad you made it into something fabulous, those look amazing!