A twist on traditional chocolate chip cookies

There is a person in our home — I won’t mention names here — who is truly addicted to chocolate. Sweets in general, really. She (oops!) gets that from my mother, who’s first sentence is reported to have been “Baby needs a cookie.” “Needs” is impressively distinct from “wants” for an emerging talker. My grandmother made some exceptionally good chocolate chip cookies, which we all craved and demanded, and my mother inherited the gift. But both my grandmother and then my father had to hide the cookies from Mom — trunk of the Cougar (found), basement loo (found), jelly cabinet (found), freezer (found, but a delicious discovery) — you name it, mom could ferret out the c.c. cookie in 15 minutes or less. Well, same with my household dweller, and they do say these things skip a generation.

Now that I’ve established said family member as being a chocolate fiend, I have to credit her for the innovation to our own chocolate chip cookie recipe. Why not use Mexican chocolate instead of chocolate chips? asks a person who’s thinking these things through. We tried it, and wow. It’s fantastic.

I’ll confess my own dependence on coffee now, since I need to balance out the accusations. One coffee drink that I particularly love is Café de Olla, a Mexican coffee made by steeping cinnamon, brown sugar (piloncillo), optional cloves, anise, or orange peel with ground coffee. When we tried our first Mexican chocolate chip cookies I thought of adding ground coffee (why not?) to give it a Cookie de Olla flavor. Wow again.

The two most commonly available brands are Ibarra and Nestle's Abuelita

Mexican chocolate is available in most grocery stores, and these two are what you’re likely to find. Like all things, each brand has its die-hard fans. I prefer Ibarra — it has a little more cinnamon flavor and the chocolate has a more bitter bite. Inside the boxes are six disks of chocolate, made from bitter, dark cacao nibs, sugar, and cinnamon. Here is a cross-section of the two brands:

Ibarra is the chocolate on top, Abuelita on the bottom

Mexican chocolate is most often used to make hot chocolate, which you do by heating 3 cups of milk with a broken up disk of chocolate, a big pinch of sugar and a pinch of salt. Froth the hot milk with a whisk or a molinillo — the wooden implement used just for this purpose — and pour into 4 mugs. Froth again in the mugs and serve with a stick of cinnamon.

On to the cookies, though, and of course the coffee.

The chocolate disk, brand imprinted in the wedges, and a few coffee beans

Mexican Chocolate Chip Cookies con Café | 36 cookies

1/2 pound unsalted butter (2 sticks), at room temperature
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup golden brown sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 1/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 disks Mexican chocolate, 3.1 ounce each
4 tablespoons freshly ground coffee (not instant), optional

Preheat the oven to 375°F. With a mixer, cream the butter.

Starting at room temperature makes this very easy

Add the two sugars and cream together with the butter. Thoroughly beat in the eggs and vanilla.

In a bowl, mix the flour with the baking soda and salt. Add the flour in two additions, beating after each one until the flour is incorporated.

Use a low speed to beat in the flour but don't overmix

Chop the chocolate disks with a heavy knife. They will crumble somewhat, so aim to have chocolate chip-sized pieces and you’ll end up with some of those and a coarse crumble.

You'll use all the "chips" as well as the crumbled chocolate

Stir all of the chopped chocolate — crumbles and chips — into the batter. If you want a coffee flavor, stir in the ground coffee with the chocolate.

When you add the coffee the batter gets a little dark and grainy

Lightly butter a cookie sheet. I like to use the paper from the sticks of butter before tossing it out. It has just enough to thinly coat the surface.

Uses up every last bit of butter

I tried three different types of cookie sheets to see which one I like best. I have a heavy French baking sheet, an inexpensive cookie sheet/jellyroll pan, and a double-wall cookie sheet (it has an insulated bottom to prevent burning).

Heavy French sheet on the left, insulated one in the middle, and traditional sheet on the bottom

Of the three, I liked the result I got with the heavy sheet and the traditional one. They both gave the cookies a nice bottom crunch, which the insulated sheet didn’t.

Using a tablespoon (mine is a soup spoon), drop blobs of dough on the cookie sheet about 3 inches apart.

I have a cookie scooper -- a mini ice cream scoop -- but I don't like it! I use my finger to slide the dough off the spoon and onto the pan

If you added the coffee, place a coffee bean on the top of the cookie dough. Bake cookies 9 to 10 minutes until golden. Cool on a cookie rack.

Oh, and don’t tell — this time I’m hiding them in the dryer.

Kelly McCune © 2009

©2012 Kitchenelly. All Rights Reserved.