Tag Archives: Chocolate chip cookie

Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie w/ Fudge Frosting

If you’re supposed to make lemonade when life gives you lemons, then what are you supposed to make when life gives you fudge frosting? I was wondering this last week as I stared down a mound of fudge frosting in my freezer that I had lefotver from making my friend’s birthday cake. I certainly wasn’t going to throw all that out. I mean, that was some incredible, fudgy, decadent frosting. I would eat it by the spoonful like ice cream if I had to. If there’s one thing you can count on, it’s that I never let good food go to waste.

After careful consideration, I dreamed up something truly delicious to do with that residual frosting. I’m talking something even better than taking an over-sized spoon and going to town. We’re going to use the fudgetastic stuff to cover a Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie. You heard it right; a gargantuan cookie packed with enough chocolate chunks to kill you and send you straight to heaven, then slathered in rich, smooth fudge frosting. Somebody hold me down; I can’t resist this much goodness!

I used what I consider to be the best chocolate chip cookie recipe in the world and essentially baked it up in a pie pan as one big cookie. The result was the most perfectly cooked slice of cookie to ever grace my mouth, with a texture so chewy and wonderful that I barely needed to chew. It was exactly the consistency I dream of cookies having. Plus, it baked up good and thick, giving you one substantial slice of soft and chewy chocolatey goodness to sink your chompers into. Top it off with that super satiny fudge frosting, and you’ve got cookieuphoria.

Guess who has a new favorite dessert? This girl!

If my opinion isn’t enough, ask my co-workers. They devoured it, very much appreciating the chocolate-to-cookie ratio and happily commenting on how the frosting was both rich yet light. There was not a crumb left when I came in the next day. If you even remotely enjoy cookies, then you will go coo-coo for this over-sized treat.

A perfectly thick, chewy, and gooey slice of cookie pie buried in frosting? It doesn’t get any better than this.

A Few Tips Before You Get Cooking:

  1. You could also do a nice vanilla buttercream on this. I happen to have the perfect recipe right here!
  2. Top with rainbow sprinkles to make this cookie pie even more fun.
  3. Don’t overbake! If you think it’s done, pull it. Overbaking leads to a less chewy cookie.
  4. You can use all dark or all milk chocolate depending on what you like. I happen to love the mix of semi-sweet and milk.
  5. You gotta use chocolate chunks in this. Chips just don’t cut it!
  6. This would still be awesome without the frosting.
  7. You will probably have leftover frosting. If you don’t have an immediate use for it, you can keep it fresh by storing it in an air-tight container in the freezer for several months.

Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie with Fudge Frosting

Ingredients

For the cookie:
Cookie recipe adapted from Baking Illustrated

  • 2 cups + 2 tablespoons unbleached all-purpose flour
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled until warm
  • 1 cup packed dark brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup granulated sugar
  • 1 large egg + 1 egg yolk
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 1 4.4-oz. milk chocolate bar, chopped into chunks (equals about 1 cup of chunks)
  • 1/2 cup additional semisweet chocolate chips

For the frosting:
Frosting recipe adapted from Epicurious

  • 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 3/4 cup half and half or cream
  • 6 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
  • 4 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 2 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Directions

1. Whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl; set aside.

2. With an electric mixer, mix the butter and sugars until thoroughly blended and fluffy. Beat in the egg, yolk, and vanilla until combined. Add the dry ingredients while beating at low speed just until combined. Stir in the chips and chunks. Cover and chill the dough in the fridge for at least an hour before continuing.

3.Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Put the dough into an 8×8 pie dish and use your hands to spread out in an even layer that fills the dish. Do not shape to the pan like a crust; this is a cookie! Cover the edges of the pan with strips of aluminum foil to ensure the edges don’t overcook. Bake for 30-45 minutes or until cookie is set and has a crackled top, removing the foil for the last 10 minutes. The edges should be just barely beginning to turn golden, and a tooth pick inserted in the center should come out with crumbs, but not goo. Let cool completely on a wire rack.

4. Meanwhile, make the frosting. Combine butter, 3/4 cup sugar,  and the half and half in a large saucepan. Stir over medium heat until sugar dissolves and mixture simmers. Remove from heat. Add both chocolates; whisk until smooth. Whisk in vanilla. Pour chocolate mixture into large bowl. Sift in powdered sugar; whisk to blend. Press plastic onto surface of frosting. Chill just until firm enough to spread, stirring occasionally, about 1 1/2 hours. Don’t over chill, or you won’t be able to spread it!

5. Spread a generous amount of frosting onto cooled cookie. Slice and serve! Store leftovers in an air-tight container. If you have leftover frosting, you can freeze it.

Colossal Chocolate Chip Cookie Sundaes

Is there anything better than a warm chocolate chip cookie fresh from the oven?

Yes, actually, there is: a warm, over-sized chocolate chip cookie, fresh from the oven, topped with cold vanilla ice cream, light whipped cream, and rich hot fudge, all homemade.

I’ve seen chocolate chip sundaes on restaurant dessert menus many times. But I can promise you those won’t hold a candle cookie to this masterpiece. I start with the best chocolate chip cookie recipe ever: so thick, chewy, and abundant with chocolate chunks. I make it about 3 times the size of an average cookie because it’s got to be able to stand up to the ice cream. That heavenly cookie, delicious enough on its own, gets baked in the oven until it reaches the point of warm, ooey, gooey perfection.

Then, while the cookie is still soft and warm, I top it with a mountain of rich and creamy homemade vanilla ice cream. Upon contact, the ice cream begins to melt, and a river of vanilla runs across the cookie’s crackled surface, seeping into every crevice. A dollop of freshly whipped cream is like the snowy peak that caps the ice cream mountain top. Finally, rich hot fudge is sent gushing over top of the entire creation like molten, fudgy lava. If you can hold out this long, it is now time to dig into this beautiful creation. I suggest bracing yourself before diving in. The complete joy that is about to overcome you may be too much to handle.

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Ice Creamie Cookie Sammies

Remember those over-the-top awesome Thick & Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies from yesterday’s post?

(You’re like: “Are you insane? How could I forget?“)

Well, the question was more rhetorical. Anyway, I’m going to show you how to take those cookies and turn them into a sweet frozen treat: Ice Cream Sandwiches.

Now, I’m sure you’ve had an ice cream sandwich or two (or a hundred) in your lifetime, back in the good ‘ol days where you would go nuts every time the ice cream truck came chugging down the road. The second his jocular jingle hit your ears, you’d beeline for your mother (or more specifically, your mother’s wallet) and beg her for some ice cream.

Ice cream sandwiches are a classic character in Mr. Ice Cream Man’s frozen confection collection. That’s why they remind me of childhood more than anything. There are two major types of ice cream sandwiches in this world: the kind with the soft brown, bar-shaped cookies and the round ones made with chocolate chip cookies. Although they’re both tasty, there’s something really special about smooth creamy ice cream sandwiched between two real chocolate chip cookies. It’s two desserts in one.

Let’s make something clear right now: these sandwiches I’m about to show you are 100 times better than any ice cream sandwich you’ve ever purchased. Nine times out of ten, homemade kicks store-bought’s butt. What makes these treats so special is that you start with a sublime cookie-base. It’s thick and sturdy, perfect for holding up to the melty ice cream. You will never find a cookie this delicious in your grocery store. Have you ever compared a fresh-baked cookie to a Chips Ahoy cookie? Enough said.

There’s one more reason these sammies take the cake: you get to pick your ice cream. No boring vanilla for you…unless vanilla’s your thing, which is totally respectable. Vanilla is classic, nothing wrong with that.

Like I said, it’s up to you.

My choice? Mint Brownie Ice Cream.

You might think mint & chocolate chip cookie to be a strange pairing, but it’s not. Think about it: All that chocolate stuffed into the cookies melts perfectly together with the sweet mint flavor of the ice cream. It’s definitely a combo worth trying.

Some other suggestions:

  • Chocolate-Peanut Butter Ice Cream (chocolate + peanut butter= yes)
  • Raspberry Ice Cream (the chocolate in the cookies will mix beautifully with the raspberry)
  • Cookies & Cream Ice Cream (two kinds of cookie in one dessert!)

Remember, you’re not limited to any of these delicious recommendations. The cookie’s on your plate.

Ice Creamie Cookie Sammies

Recipe by Colleen Bierstine

(Makes 4 cookie sammies)

Ingredients:

  • 8 Thick & Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies (recipe here)
  • Ice cream of your choice

Special Equipment:

  • Ice cream scooper
  • Aluminum foil

Directions:

1)      Remove ice cream from freezer. Allow to sit for ten minutes, or until slightly softened. You want the ice cream to be malleable but not melted.

2)      Match up cookies by size so that each has a pair of similar radius. Unevenly matched cookies will make the sandwich unstable. You should have 4 cookie pairs.

3)      Using the ice cream scooper, scoop out one well-rounded ball of ice cream. Turn a cookie upside down and place the ice cream on the bottom of the cookie. Take its pair and place it on top of the ice cream ball, making a sandwich.

With your hands flat on each cookie, gently press the cookies together, twisting them back and forth, until the ice cream is flattened out to the edge of the cookies. Don’t over-press it or you’ll make a mess!

4)      Repeat with the 3 remaining cookie pairs. If you wish to make the sammies look prettier, gently glide a butter knife around the edge of the ice cream, smoothing it out.

5)      Wrap the sammies in aluminum foil and store in the freezer for at least 30 minutes so that the ice cream can firm up again. These will last up to two weeks in the freezer. Eat when you’re ready & enjoy!

SO EASY.

And so delicious! I bet you thought those Thick & Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies couldn’t get any better. I did too. We were naive, my fellow foodies. In this case, ignorance is not always bliss; Ice Creamie Cookie Sammies are!

Thick & Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Thick & chewy. I couldn’t have said it better myself.

This cookie recipe gets around. It has popped up in other food blogs like Poptarts out of a toaster. And that’s exactly why I felt compelled to whip up a batch. You see, in every one of these blogs, the cookies received rave reviews; some bloggers even called them the best cookies they ever had. I knew I had to give it a try.

I went into this recipe feeling apprehensive. Something in the directions had caught me off guard.

There was this complicated, perplexing process described for forming the dough. Anyone whose made cookies before could understand my confusion when I thought: “Don’t you just plop some dough on the tray? Why complicate it?”

Well, my friends, this little curve ball might just be the recipe’s secret weapon. Never have I seen a homemade chocolate chip cookie recipe yield such thick results. I’m talkin’ sink-your-teeth-into-a-good-inch-or-two-of-heaven thick. Plus, it was nice and chewy, not rock hard like many store-bought cookies are.

Look at that!

I admit it: these are the best chocolate chip cookies I’ve ever had.

The dough-forming method, although obscure, is key. Don’t skip it. I promise you won’t regret it. Plus, I’ve added a step-by-step breakdown to make it easier for you (sure wish I’d had one of those…).

And did I mention, these cookies are super-sized? They’re behemoths.

I’m not talking so big that you can’t eat a whole cookie in one sitting (believe me, that won’t be a problem); I’m just talking satisfyingly-sized. This is a substantial cookie, the way things should be; they’re not puny like those break-and-bake imposters in the supermarket.

But wait. It gets better. You see, I believe a chocolate chip cookie should be sinfully chocolatey. And for all you fellow chocolate-admirers, I’m going to show you how to take this recipe to the next level. What’s the secret?

Chocolate chunks.

Milk chocolate chunks, a whole cup of ‘em lovingly tossed into the dough, plus a half cup of semi-sweet chips thrown in just because we can. Now we’re talking.  Chunks give you way more chocolate impact per bite than chips do (sorry chips; I still love you). Not a big fan of overly chocolately chocolate chip cookies? That’s totally fine. I’ve covered your needs too. There’s room for everyone in the Chocolate Chip Cookie World.

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