Ultimate Chocolate Cookie Book - Bruce Weinstein [4]
2. Sift the cocoa powder.
Always sift cocoa powder through a fine-mesh strainer to get rid of any lumps formed by excessive humidity or other moisture. Press any lumps with the back of a wooden spoon to break them into powder.
We rarely ask you to sift the flour. A couple of recipes call for this step, but they have special pleadings due to the consistency of the batter, usually cakier than that of the standard cookie.
3. Have the eggs at room temperature.
Cold eggs can cause melted chocolate to seize. They can also lead to tough cookies since they can cause the softened butter to firm up unexpectedly, just when it should be adhering to the proteins. To bring eggs to room temperature, set them out on the counter for 15 minutes (while the oven is preheating, perhaps) or submerge them in a bowl of warm (not hot) water for 5 minutes.
4. Use cool butter unless the recipe indicates otherwise.
Some cooking myths refuse to die. One of the most persistent is the one about making batters with room-temperature butter, which could be anywhere between 70°F and 85°F, depending on your personal taste and monthly heating budget.
When making a batter, you beat the butter to aerate it, to get tiny air bubbles into the batter’s structure. Problem is, butterfat begins to melt around 68°F and can then no longer form a structure for the batter. If you want to trap air bubbles, you need the butter to be colder than 68°F.
We recommend taking the unsalted butter out of the refrigerator, cutting it into small pieces, and letting it stand for just 2 or 3 minutes. It will be cool, not cold. Now beat it with an electric mixer at medium speed until softened, not runny. With a stand mixer, softening cool butter is no problem. If you have a handheld mixer, you can use the beaters like a pastry cutter to cut the butter into finer and finer pieces while beating.
5. Pack the brown sugar.
Brown sugar is coarser than granulated sugar, so it needs to be packed into measuring cups and spoons to avoid needless air pockets. Don’t smash it down until the sugar’s a rock; press down once with the back of a spoon, then fill the measuring cup or spoon again before leveling it off.
6. Avoid sticky utensils.
Sidestep a sink full of sticky utensils by weighing out the solid vegetable shortening. Put your mixing bowl on the kitchen scale, calibrate it to zero, then add enough shortening to come up to the recipe’s required amount. Here’s an easy reference chart:
1 tablespoon = ½ ounce
2 tablespoons = 1 ounce
¼ cup (or 4 tablespoons) = 2 ounces
½ cup (or 8 tablespoons) = 4 ounces
1 cup (or 16 tablespoons) = 8 ounces
To get sticky honey or molasses out of a measuring cup, first spray the cup lightly with nonstick spray, then measure out what you need. The fine coating will help the sticky liquid pour easily into the batter.
7. Let the electric mixer do most of the work—from softening the butter to mixing in the flour.
Some chefs still beat the butter by hand, then fold in the dry ingredients with a rubber spatula. But a mixer will get more air into the butter before it’s above 68°F and loses its elasticity.
A mixer will also get the flour quickly into the batter before the glutens become sticky. It can also get a fine dusting of flour all over you and your kitchen. To avoid this cleanup nightmare, turn the beaters off before you add the flour, then beat at the lowest speed possible. If you’re working in a bowl smaller than the large ones associated with stand mixers, add the flour in stages, a little at a time, so that it doesn’t rise up above the bowl’s rim as it’s beaten in.
8. Reverse the baking sheets halfway during baking.
For the best air flow, we almost always ask you to rotate the baking sheets. If the recipe asks you to bake one sheet at a time, rotate it front to back, 180 degrees, halfway through baking. If you’re using two, rotate each