Ingredients:
- 1 cup butter (I used salted.)
- 1 ½ cups packed brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 egg yolk
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2½ cups all-purpose flour (350g; don't pack flour...spoon it into measuring cup.)
- 15-20 fun-size chocolate candy bars (I used Reese's PB cups, plain M&Ms, KitKats, and Crunch bars. Pre-chop these prior to starting the directions. I popped them into my freezer for easy mixing later!)
- flaked sea salt (for sprinkling)
Directions:
- In a bowl, whisk together the baking soda, salt, and flour. Set aside.
- Place the butter and brown sugar in a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment (or regular bowl with hand mixer). Beat on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes.
- Add egg and yolk, one at a time, and mix until smooth on low speed. Beat in vanilla.
- Slowly mix in dry ingredients, being careful not to over mix. It's best to stop when there's some flour remnants around the bowl. Stir the chocolate bars into the dough until well combined. (I used my hand mixer on the lowest setting to do this. The candy bars being frozen helped!)
- Using a cookie/ice cream scoop (I love this one), start scooping! At this point you can either have the patience to chill the dough (knowing the results will be better), or just bake your cookies immediately (because you just can't seem to resist). I like to scoop out all the balls and lay them out on a parchment lined cookie sheet, and then refrigerate for at least 2 hours. (Original recipe makes 16; mine made exactly 15. They're comparable in size to Crumbl!)
- When ready to bake, turn the oven on to 350 degrees, and line 2 cookie sheets with parchment paper. Place 8 chilled cookie dough balls on the cookie sheet, sprinkling with flaked sea salt (optional). "Some people salt their cookies after they bake them, but I like to do both. This gives the salt that falls off the tops an opportunity to bake underneath the cookie and give even that much more flavor."
- Bake the cookies for 11-13 minutes. You're looking for a nice golden brown outside, with a slightly glossy texture to the inside. If your cookies don't come out in a perfect circle, take a spatula and circle tap the rim of the cookie to bring in any spots that have spread a little too far.
- "I prefer to only bake the amount of cookies we are going to eat at the time, which is usually one cookie sheet worth." Freeze the rest of the dough balls in a ziplock, and pull out whenever you're craving a warm cookie or two.
*www.thesaltedsweets.com
