Chewiest Chunkiest Choc Chip Cookies

The Great British Bake Off returns to our screens tonight. I had convinced myself I wouldn’t be watching – the defection from the BBC to Channel 4 left a bad taste in my mouth.. I felt the series had run its course, and I didn’t want to watch a watered down version with unfamiliar presenters and a ridiculous amount of adverts.

However, the trailers and promos have done their job – and the promise of all that cake porn is getting too much for me. I’ll give them two episodes before making my mind up…

But one thing Bake Off does mean, whether you’re watching or not, is that baking fever hits the nation, and what better excuse for a bit of pure indulgence? So I’m sharing one of my favourite baking recipes in celebration.

This has been my go-to cookie recipe for years. I found it online as part of a blog many moons ago and cut it out to stick in a recipe journal, but never managed to find the blog again, so apologies if this is your recipe. They are everything a good cookie should be, with crisp edges, a soft chewy middle, and great big chunks of chocolate running through them. The brown sugar and vanilla gives them a wonderful buttery caramel flavour. The dough freezes extremely well so you can save half for a batch at a later date. It’d also be great stirred through vanilla ice cream to make cookie dough ice cream – but does contain raw eggs.

Ingredients

170g unsalted butter

300g plain flour

1/2 Tsp bicarb of soda

1 tsp fine sea salt

215g light brown soft sugar

120g granulated sugar

1 tbsp vanilla extract

1 large egg

1 large egg yolk

100g of milk chocolate, chopped into chunks

100g white chocolate, chopped into chunks

100g dark chocolate, chopped into chunks

Method

Melt the butter in a saucepan or in a bowl in the microwave and leave to cool for a few minutes

Put the flour, bicarb and salt into a large bowl

Stir together the melted butter, brown and white sugars, and vanilla until the sugar has dissolved a little. Add the egg and egg yolk and beat together. Pour this mix into the dry ingredients and stir together, before adding the chocolate chunks. Stir together until it forms a dough, then cover the bowl with clingfilm and put in the fridge for around half an hour.

Heat the oven to 190 and grease two baking trays

When the dough has cooled and firmed up, shape it into balls and flatten slightly – to form a chunky discs approximately 6cm across. Spread the cookies out on the trays with plenty of spreading room around each one, then bake in batches in the oven for 10-12 minutes until golden brown.