Triple Chocolate Espresso Bean Cookies
Consider yourself warned - this is a cookie dough you can't resist sampling, raw egg roulette is in your future if you make a batch. Hopefully you have more willpower than I do and at the very least buy good, fresh, organic, free range eggs. They are deliciously sophisticated in flavor with the crunch from the espresso beans playing off the dense cakiness of the cookie. Next time around I want a touch more ooey-gooey factor, so I'll stir in 3/4 of a cup of semi-sweet chips. I'll factor that into the recipe below.
Consider yourself warned - this is a cookie dough you can't resist sampling, raw egg roulette is in your future if you make a batch. Hopefully you have more willpower than I do and at the very least buy good, fresh, organic, free range eggs. They are deliciously sophisticated in flavor with the crunch from the espresso beans playing off the dense cakiness of the cookie. Next time around I want a touch more ooey-gooey factor, so I'll stir in 3/4 of a cup of semi-sweet chips. I'll factor that into the recipe below.
- 2 1/2 cups whole-wheat pastry flour
- 2 tablespoons espresso powder freshly ground
- 3/4 teaspoon aluminum-free baking soda
- 3/4 teaspoon aluminum-free baking powder
- 3/4 teaspoon sea salt finely ground
- 1/2 cup natural cocoa or cacao powder (scharffen b or dagoba), not dutched
- 1 cup organic unsalted butter room temperature (soft to the touch)
- 2 cups fine-grained natural granulated sugar (evaporated cane sugar) for example, i love alter-eco brand, o
- 2 large organic eggs
- 3 teaspoons vanilla extract high-quality
- 3/4 cup organic semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 8 chocolate covered espresso beans
- Carbohydrate 412.387200002001 g
- Cholesterol 364.42 mg
- Fat 108.125304000024 g
- Fiber 46.1691999786794 g
- Protein 48.392224000594 g
- Saturated Fat 64.1516160000096 g
- Serving Size 1 1 Dozen (658g)
- Sodium 1286.5156000018 mg
- Sugar 366.218000023322 g
- Trans Fat 8.19215840000322 g
- Calories 2606 calories
Step-by-step
- Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.
- In a medium bowl whisk together the whole wheat pastry flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and cacao powder. Set aside.
- In a big bowl or with an electric mixer beat the butter until it is fluffy and lightens a bit in color. Now beat in the sugar it should have a thick frosting-like consistency. Mix in the eggs one at a time, making sure the first egg gets incorporated before adding the next. You will need to scrape down the sides of the bowl once or twice as well. Add the vanilla and mix until it is incorporated.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet mix in about four waves. Stir a bit between each addition until the flour is just incorporated. You could add all the flour at once, but it tends to explode up and out of the mixing bowl and all over me every time I do that. At this point you should have a moist, brown dough that is uniform in color. Stir in the espresso beans and chocolate chips by hand and mix only until they are evenly distributed throughout the dough.
- I like to make these cookies medium in size (they are rich!) - and use roughly one heaping tablespoons of dough for each one. I leave the dough balls rough and raggy looking - I never roll them into perfect balls or anything like that - this way each cookie will have a bit of unique personality.
- Bake at 375 degrees for about 10 minutes on the middle rack. You don't want to over bake these cookies at all or they will really dry out. If anything, under bake them just a bit. When they are done, pull them out to cool.
Swapping the whole-wheat pastry flour for all-purpose unbleached flour alters the structural integrity of these cookies, yielding a much more delicate crumb that spreads faster in a 375-degree oven. Adjusting quantities up or down requires careful math because whole-wheat pastry flour absorbs moisture differently than refined wheat, meaning direct one-to-one volume swaps can easily lead to a dry, crumbly mass if the butter-to-flour ratio shifts even slightly outside the optimal zone.
- Incorporate dry ingredients in four distinct waves to prevent flour clouds while ensuring the gluten does not overdevelop during the mixing process.
- Beat the room-temperature butter and granulated sugar until the mixture achieves a thick, frosting-like consistency before introducing the eggs one at a time.
- Bake for precisely 10 minutes on the middle oven rack, pulling the batch out while the centers still look slightly underdone to preserve moisture.
- Store leftover baked cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to three days, though the chocolate-covered espresso bean crunch will soften significantly by day two.
Day-old specimens lose their initial textural contrast as the fats migrate into the surrounding crumb. Reviving stale leftovers requires a brief five-minute stint in a low 300-degree oven to reset the chocolate and restore the exterior snap.
