Brown Butter Caramelized White Chocolate Macadamia Cookies
Also called white chocolate macadamia cookies, caramelized white chocolate cookies
Huge, thick, gooey cookies with brown butter, caramelized white chocolate and salted macadamias.
- Makes
- 8 cookies of about 145 g
A reconstruction of a Miss Betty Bakes cookie from its description, not her recipe
Ingredients
Amounts are for the recipe. Sizes, times and temperatures in the method are not scaled.
Caramelized white chocolate
Cookie dough
Amounts worked out from the other system are rounded.
Method
Caramelize the chocolate. This can be done a day ahead. Heat the oven to 120°C (250°F). Chop the white chocolate (300 g10½ oz) and spread it on a rimmed sheet lined with a silicone mat or parchment. Bake 45 to 60 minutes, stirring and smearing every 10 minutes, until it is the color of peanut butter. It turns chalky midway; keep stirring and it smooths out. Stir in the pinch of flaky salt, spread thin, cool, and refrigerate until hard. Set aside 75 g for the dough. Break the rest into chunks and freeze them.
Brown the butter. Melt the unsalted butter (226 g1 cup) in a light-colored pan over medium heat and whisk in the milk powder, if using. Cook, stirring, until the solids are deep brown and nutty, 6 to 10 minutes. Scrape into a bowl with all the browned bits and, while it is still warm, stir in the reserved caramelized chocolate until melted and smooth. Add the milk (15 g1 tbsp) and chill until firm but soft, about 45 minutes.
Beat the brown butter with the dark brown sugar (200 g1 cup) and granulated sugar (25 g2 tbsp) for 2 minutes. Beat in the large egg (1), egg yolk (1) and vanilla (2 tsp).
Whisk the all-purpose flour (165 g1⅓ cups), bread flour (165 g1¼ cups), cornstarch (7 g1 tbsp), baking soda (4.5 g¾ tsp), baking powder (2 g½ tsp) and salt (1 tsp). Mix in on low until just combined.
Fold in the frozen chocolate chunks and the macadamias (130 g1 cup).
Portion into 8 balls of about 145 g, shaped taller than wide. Press extra chunks on top. Chill overnight; the melted chocolate softens the dough, and cold dough keeps the cookies tall.
Heat the oven to 200°C (400°F). Bake 4 to a sheet, straight from the fridge, for 11 to 14 minutes, until the edges are golden and the centers look underdone.
Sprinkle with flaky salt and rest on the sheet 10 to 15 minutes to finish setting.
Notes
- Temperature. 400°F is deliberate. Cold, tall dough baked hot sets on the outside before the middle spreads, which gives height and a gooey center.
- Chocolate. Valrhona Ivoire, Callebaut and Guittard all caramelize well. Valrhona Dulcey is caramelized white chocolate ready-made.
- Homemade caramelized white chocolate is untempered and softer than the bar, so it can melt into pools. Freezing the chunks prevents that.
- The granulated sugar is low because the white chocolate melted into the dough adds its own.