I saw these Salted Chocolate Chunk Shortbread Cookies in the NY Times, where they were touted as the unsolicited answer to chocolate chips cookies. I’m calling them a delicious alternative. Emphasis on the “delicious.” They’re exquisite.

Ingredients for 20-24 cookies (3 inches in diameter), serving 20-24:

9 oz. salted butter, cold, cut into ½-inch pieces (1 cup + 2 Tbs, or 2¼ sticks)
3.5 oz. granulated sugar (½ cup)
1.875 oz. light brown sugar (¼ cup)
1 tsp homemade vanilla extract
6.875 oz. bread flour + 5.625 oz. cake flour (2½ cups all-purpose flour)
6 oz. semi-sweet or bittersweet dark chocolate, chopped (1 cup)
1 large egg, beaten
Demerara sugar, for rolling
Sea salt flakes, for sprinkling

How to Do It:

1. Using a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter, both sugars, and vanilla, ramping your way up to speed 6 (of 10), until the mixture is light and fluffy, 4 to 5 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and, with the mixer on low, slowly add the flour, followed by the chocolate, and mix just to blend. Compress the dough, in the bowl, with your hands, just enough to get it into a single, cohesive mass.
2. Divide the dough in half. Do this to each half: place it on a large piece of plastic wrap, fold the plastic over so that it covers the dough, then form the dough (manhandling it somewhat) into a tight, compact log, rolling it on the counter to smooth it out. Unwrap and then rewrap the dough toward the end, to make sure you haven’t folded any of the plastic into the interior of the log. Each log should be 6 inches long. Chill until totally firm, at least 2 hours if not overnight.
3. Line two baking sheets with Silpats. Heat the oven to 350ºF. Brush the outside of the logs lightly but thoroughly with the beaten egg and roll them in the Demerara, pressing it on a little. Try to get a lot of sugar onto the logs.
4. Using a serrated knife, carefully slice each log into ½-inch-thick rounds, trying for about 10-12 cookies per roll. Try to rely more on sawing than pressing down into the dough. Pressing will break the slices off the roll instead of cleanly cutting them. If they do break, it’s easy to press them back together, but those cookies will never be pretty enough to be a newscaster for Fox. It helps to set the knife, then place the heel of your non-knifed hand on the log, with the fingers of that same hand over the knife and onto the end of the log, using that hand to compress the log as you slice. Thus you hold the piece you’re slicing off close to the log, so that it doesn’t peel away as you slice. (This peeling away action contributes to breakage.) Place the cookies on the prepared baking sheets about 1 inch apart – they won’t spread much. Sprinkle with salt, taking care to distribute flakes sparsely but consistently. Bake until the edges have relaxed a bit, and you start to see signs of browning, about 15 minutes. Let cool until easy to handle.

Notes:

1. I was one of those annoying kids who used to ask, in math class, “Why do we have to know this.” Now I’m one of those cultural elite wannabes who has to ask the internet time and time again to convert .875 to a fraction. (It’s 7/8. And .625 is 5/8.)
2. That you don’t have to wait for the butter to come to room temperature isn’t my favorite thing about these cookies, but I won’t deny how much it excites me.
3. I had two bars of chocolate that I’d been given for Christmas: both Lindt, one dark chocolate sesame, the other dark chocolate lime zest. Both 100-gram bars gave me just a tad more (bonus, because I got to enjoy a bit of them as they are – and they’re delicious) than I needed for a single batch of these cookies, so I divided the batter before adding the chocolate into each 13-oz. half-batch. I thought the sesame would be so good – I mean “Salted Sesame Chocolate Chunk Shortbread” sounds so magical, cookies should appear out of thin air whenever you say it, right? Well, they were meh. The sesame is too rich for the already-rich shortbread. The lime cookies, though, were out of this world! The lime zest is delightfully subtle. Even though you pick up on it right away – in aroma even more than in taste – it comes off as a tantalizing citrus note that only after a few bites you realize is lime.
4. The point of the egg wash is to get the sugar to adhere. If you lay it on too thick, the sugar will dissolve. You’ll still get a glistening sheen, but you won’t get those cool crystals.
5. You need less salt than you think. Ask yourself how many bites you think is in each cookie. Four? Six? One flake per bite, with the occasional two-flake bite is all you need.
6. I think one cookie is plenty per serving. Some – including those whom I admire – guffaw, but I swear to you, I can eat like nobody’s business, and just one of these cookies is enough for me. They’re quite rich.
7. In terms of texture, I think this is not the time to whip out that big fat brick of Callebaut. I think you’ll be better served by a flat chocolate bar, because you’ll wind up with flatter chunks that will complement the cookie’s dimensions. Save the Callebaut for another cookie. Also, this is a good time to be anal retentive about chopping. Carefully dice those chocolate bars into little bits. Large-size chunks will deform the finished cookie.
8. Don’t you just want to add macadamia nuts to these cookies? Well, don’t. It will lessen the cookie’s cohesion just enough that they’ll be too delicate. I think that in order to accommodate nuts, you have to adjust the recipe.

Like all good, homemade shortbreads, Salted Chocolate Chunk Shortbread Cookies have a delicate crunch with a texture that instantly dissolves into buttery goodness in your mouth. There’s exactly enough chocolate to complement the cookie, not only in taste, but in texture. The sharp crunch and high pitch of the salt flakes tease you here and there as you come across them. This cookie really has a lot going for it. Impressive, New York Times, impressive. (5 / 5)

Salted Chocolate Chunk Shortbread Cookies

Thanks for Joe Pastry for help with volume conversions. Also, thank you, Textalyser.Credit for images on this page: Make It Like a Man! This content was not solicited by anyone, nor was it written in exchange for anything.

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