Soft and chewy Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies made from scratch.
Ingredients
- 230 grams (2 sticks or 1 cup) butter, roughly chopped
- 280 grams (2 cups) plain flour or all purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon cornflour or corn starch
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 100 grams (1/2 cup) caster sugar or granulated sugar
- 90 grams (1/2 cup) brown sugar
- 150 grams (1 cup) chocolate chips
- 75 grams (1/2 cup) milk chocolate, roughly chopped
- 1 large egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 tablespoon full fat or whole milk
- Sea salt
Instructions
- Place butter in a medium-sized saucepan*, and pop on low-medium heat. Gently stir the butter as it melts. Watch closely and keep stirring as the butter melts, then slowly starts to brown and go a little bit foamy.
- The butter will turn golden, and then eventually a deeper amber colour. Little flecks of milk solids will appear and it will have a toasty, caramel-like aroma. It might also have quite a thick head of foam by this point. See photo below for visual. The whole process can take up to 10 minutes.
- Pour browned butter into a medium-sized bowl and set aside to cool for about 30 minutes or until the butter is no longer hot to the touch. It’s ok if it’s still a little warm.
- In a separate mixing bowl, add flour, cornflour, baking soda, sugars and chocolate, stir briefly. In another small bowl, add egg, vanilla and milk. Stir with a fork just to break up the egg yolk.
- To the browned butter, add the dry ingredients, along with the wet ingredients, and gently stir together until a wet and shiny cookie dough forms.
- Cover cookie dough with plastic wrap and place it in the fridge for AT LEAST 24 hours. If you don’t chill the dough, the cookies will spread too much in the oven.
- When you are ready to bake the cookies, take the cookie dough out of the fridge about 30 minutes or 1 hour ahead of time until it’s soft enough to scoop/roll.
- Preheat oven to 180 C (350 F) standard / 160 C (320 F) fan-forced. Line two baking trays with baking or parchment paper.
- Scoop cookie dough, roughly 1.5 tablespoons each, and place on baking trays, leaving room for cookies to spread out in the oven.
- Bake cookies for approximately 12 minutes or until golden. Sprinkle cookies with sea salt. Leave to cool completely.
Notes
*Saucepan: A light coloured saucepan is best so you can see clearly when the butter is browned.
Browning the butter: Don’t rush this step. If you take butter off too early, it won’t have that deep, caramel-like flavour we are looking for. On the other hand, if you leave it too long or have the heat too high, you can accidentally burn the butter. Remember to keep stirring and watch your butter closely.
Cornflour: Just a tablespoon of cornflour will help keep the cookies lovely and soft. I highly recommend using it. If you don’t have access to this ingredient, you leave it out or replace it with a level tablespoon of plain or all purpose flour.
Chocolate chips: I used milk chocolate chips in this recipe, but you can use dark or semi-sweet chocolate chips.
Milk chocolate: I recommend using a block of good quality chocolate that you’ve roughly chopped by hand. You can use milk, dark or semi-sweet chocolate if you prefer.
Chilling time: For best results I recommend chilling the dough for at LEAST 24 hours. If you don’t, your cookies will spread too much when baked. This also lets the flavour develop for a rich, buttery result.
