Sure, you can try adding some cocoa. Start with 3 to 5 tablespoons and make sure to sift it together with the flour. Cheers!

Well, will I have to use less flour?

No, the amount of flour should not change. Cheers!

Thanks, but wouldn't that affect the texture?!

It should be fine. Cocoa tends to dissolve quite a bit when combined with wet ingredients. Cheers!

I don't have a electric mixer...any suggestions if mixing the batter by hand

The batter can be mixed by hand - even with a spatula or wooden spoon. There is a note in the text recipe:

*Note: For cookies with a chewier texture, melt the butter and let cool slightly. Use a wooden spoon to mix the cookie dough together. A mixer incorporates more air into the dough, which will make the cookies cakier. Cheers!

Here is a maybe silly question: Can the chocolate chips in this recipe be substituted with raisins or cherries for example to turn it into raisin cookies or cherry cookies? Just curious

all I have right now is salted butter would I use less salt or would that not work

It's up to you. You can substitute raisins, cherries or nuts...whatever you prefer. I do remember seeing a funny t-shirt though that said, "Stupid raisins...stay out of my cookies". My husband brings that up every time I attempt to put them in there. Haha. Cheers!

If all you have is salted butter, you can substitute it but hold back on the fleur de sel. Might be too overpowering. Next time, make sure to buy unsalted butter as that is what we bake and cook with almost all of the time. It allows you to control the level of salt in all of your cooking/baking. Cheers!

Hi! I'm about to make these and I noticed the recipe calls for one tablespoon of vanilla. Is that correct? Most other recipes I've used call for one teaspoon (not tablespoon). I've never used that much- just wanted to check with you first!

1 tablespoon is the correct measure for this recipe. You're going to love them. Enjoy!

Recipes are a great way to learn another language. I tutor a few kids in the neighborhood with their English lessons and when I whipped up a batch of these great cookies at the end of the school year this past June, the mothers wanted to know how to do it themselves. What better way to motivate kids to learn than to give them a chocolate-chip-cookie-baking lesson in English. The kids baked, the mothers watched.
I just thought you'd like to know Dawn, your recipe has not only made a number of Spanish kids very, very happy with these cookies (unknown here in this village before), but they now understand a few difficult verbs too.

Super cool! Thanks for sharing that Jim :-)

Hi,

This post does not relate to the recipe, but to one of the related videos I watched on wooden spoons. The video says to wash with soap and water. Growing up, I learned never to use soap when washing wood, and just scrubbed with hot water. Do you know why many people think soap should not be used and why you recommend using it?

Also, feel free to let me know if there is a more appropriate place on the site for this question.

Thank you!
Katie

Some people do, some people don't. When wooden spoons are really dirty, we prefer to use a bit of soap to clean them. It's really up to you. As long as they are rinsed very well and left to dry completely, they will be fine. Cheers!

Made these cookies for the 3rd time since I've learnt it here and again they were a hit among my team. What I've learnt so far from this recipe:

- Melted butter (this step was a lesson in temperature control/time management with the microwave/refrigerator considering that I reside in a tropical climate)
- Creaming Butter and Sugar Properly (recognising colour change from yellow to pale yellow/ivoryish)
- Substituting some white sugar for brown sugar to adjust sweetness
- Fleur de Sel (acquired a small tub after learning of its existence from here, however I prefer regular salt for even saltiness in my cookies and will save the exquisite salt for my meats instead ;-) )
- That I don't need to get the whole cookie to bake till dark brown; just the edges and it's perfecto
- Time management (I'm still not able to make this in the stipulated 30 min cooking time but at least I know what not to do compared to when I first started out :-) )

Thanks Rouxbe!

My choco chip cookies have been coming out great in the past. I just baked some and changed the recipe a bit and had interesting (although not as good) results. I basically use a recipe that calls for 2 sticks (8 oz) of butter. This time I used 2 1/2 sticks. I found that the cookies did not rise like they had previously. Now my questions is do you believe the extra butter had something to do with this or could my baking soda possibly have died on me (it's older than I care to admit, however, my cookies rose just fine 2 month ago with said Baking soda). The funny thing is I've always said to myself that I wanted flatter cookies and now that I made them I prefer them a little puffier. I noticed that your recipe calls for 6 oz of butter, I just used about 10 oz. Almost twice as much. I have a feeling it was the butter.

It's hard to say what exactly was the cause without knowing the other ingredients in the other recipe you used. A high fat/low moisture ratio in the batter can cause the cookies to be crispy and can also be quite thin. Also, there are several factors that can cause cookies to spread. High amounts of granulated sugar or baking soda and the way in which the ingredients are combined (how much air is incorporated into the batter), as well as the temperature of your oven all will have an impact.

Good for trying different things out, but I say if you liked the cookies in the past, I'd stick with it. Not entirely clear if you have given this particular recipe a try but this is a great formula. I actually just made a batch the other night and used some quality, milk-chocolate chips and they were very yummy. And yes, old baking soda can cause the cookies not to rise, so it is worth it to get a new box. Cheers!

I just realized that I put one cup of white sugar too much into this recipe. It hit me when I read your comment about too much granulated sugar. My measuring cup goes to two cups and instead of pouring 3/4 cup of white sugar I pored 1 3/4 cups (further evidence of my impending dementia). I presume that was the problem. I do have a question about your comment regarding air incorporation. Are you saying not to mix the batter as much or, conversely, if you want a flater cookie to mix it a bit longer than normal? I'm assuming longer batter mixing equals more air incorporation.

I threw away the first batch of cookies. I do have dough which i put in the freezer. I was wondering if i could simply add some flour to the reamaining dough and remix to even out the sugar level better. Will this just ruin all the proportions of everything or is it worth a try.?

It sounds like it was the sugar as well. Regarding air, it depends on the formula, but in general the more you cream butter and sugar, the cookies can potentially spread. If you cream the butter and sugar less, the cookies can be more dense.

Batter that is already made and frozen will be difficult to tweak. By trying to add flour at that stage, it will be difficult to incorporate and you'll wind up over mixing...which can lead to a tough cookie. You can try, but I don't know what the result will be like. We have all made measuring mistakes. This is why it is best to all your mise en place measured out (double check the amounts) before you start mixing. Cheers!

I've made these a few times successfully, but I've always wondered why only the yoke of the second egg should be added rather than two whole eggs. I see above that April mentioned something about it and Joe responded, but I'm not sure if the logic for this is to maintain the thicker form. I've made these cookies with other recipes in the past with whole eggs and kept the batter cold until baking, which seemed to be enough to make the cookies thick and chewy.

So my question is why leave out the egg white?

Thanks!
Jim

By the way, I only recently found Fleur de sal here in Spain and yes, it does make a difference in the flavor. Great tip. For those in Spain, you can find it at Eroski, Carrefour, and probably El Corte Inglés.

Eggs perform many functions in baking. They help to leaven, flavor, tenderize, stabilize, enrich, bind and emulsify. They add color, nutritional value and help to extend a product's shelf life.

Egg yolks contain fat and will therefore add more richness to the batter (egg whites contain no fat). An extra egg white will add additional moisture to the formula and could result in a different final consistency/texture. Other recipes may have had more dry ingredients in them to compensate for the extra moisture (or they will simply produce a different texture).

There are so many factors at play (how the batter was mixed, handled, the temperature of the butter, the oven, etc.) that will all have an impact on the final result. It takes time to understand the functions of each ingredient and how they affect baked goods. With baking, it's often harder to tweak ingredients. That's why baking revolves around formulas and when you find a good one, you should stick with it. It takes plenty of baking experience (and possibly many failed attempts) to alter a formula. The best learning is to try it out but do so with an open mind because the result may be less than satisfactory. Hope this helps. Cheers!

That explains it! I should have checked the proportions of the ingredients in the other recipe as well. Yes, it has more flour. I'm sticking to this recipe though and as I've mentioned earlier in this thread, I've used it in my lesson plans.
Thank you so much Kimberly.
Cheers to you too!
Jim