Egg Yolk Chocolate Chunk Cookies — Yes, Please Baked Goods

Gluten-free

A cookie that I made purely by accident (well not really accident, but on a whim) that ended up being one of my all time favorite cookies that I have ever had or made.

I have a lot of cookbooks, mostly of the baking variety, but one of my favorite books is the Violet Bakery cookbook. Claire Ptak worked for Alice Waters, she made the wedding cake for Kate and Will’s wedding and her baked goods are simple, homey (in the best way possible) and always delicious,

I dream of going to her bakery in London one day, but in the meantime, I will read her cookbook. One of the recipes that she has that caught my eye was a chocolate chip cookie made with egg yolks. No whole eggs, just yolks. Novel, but it also made sense to me. I have riffed on her recipe before, but with this recipe I finally got it right.

I thought that it was a mistake at first, like it was a fluke that these cookies came out so well, but then I tried making them again. I had my friend Desiree make them too and she loved them. So here we go, my recipe for the ultimate chocolate chip cookies.

But first, as always, the usual ingredient break down.

Egg Yolks

So why only egg yolks? First, egg yolks are full of the fat and richness in an egg. When you only use egg yolks in a cookie, you get a seriously deep flavor to the dough. I do not know how to describe the flavor. Also, since egg yolks contain about half of the protein in the egg as well as the fat. Those two things combined make for a great cookie.

Now, the size of your eggs matter. I only use large eggs. I typically buy locally raised eggs, but if those are not available I got for Vital Farm eggs. If you look at the different between the color of the yolk in local eggs vs the eggs that are mass produced, you will see what I mean.

Do you need to buy the fancy eggs? No. Buy the eggs you can. And save the egg whites.

Brown Butter

Beurre Noisette. That’s that the French call brown butter (literally translates to hazelnut butter) and it is the first time (and way) I ever heard of brown butter. I am pretty sure that I was reading Julia Child’s cookbook or watching her PBS show and brown butter came up.

I made it once and it was love at first sniff. The smell of browning butter is heavenly. A nutty, sweet, caramel-like aroma wafts up from the pan and that flavor in them carried through every bite of these cookies. Browning butter means that you are browning the milk solids. Milk has natural sugars, which as sugar likes to do, brown when heated.

There are two camps in brown butter: the strainers and the non-strainers. Some say to remove the browned solids from the hot browned butter. I do not do that. I think that leaving them in enhances the flavor of the cookie. Just make sure you are using unsalted butter. If you use salted butter, the salty flavor will only intensify during the browning process.

You can certainly use melted vegan butter or all olive oil (or any oil you have) if you do not eat dairy.

Milk Powder

I will go to many lengths to make the perfect cookie. That includes researching, testing and collecting any ingredient that will make that cookie I dream of. I read Christina Tosi’s Milk Bar Life cookbook about 8 years ago. Her chocolate chip cookies had milk powdered added to them. I tried it, I loved it. Milk powder (I do not use nonfat milk powder, but whole instead) adds protein and fat to the cookies, which are particularly important in gluten-free baking.

Gluten is a protein and helps to create that chew in a cookie. Without gluten, the milk powder adds some protein (in addition to the eggs) as well as some more moisture and fat. Do you need the milk powder? No. You do not need it, but it is one of those things that can help.

Don’t eat dairy? Alright, no milk powder. There is powdered coconut milk, which you can add too. It will not have the protein you need, but it does have fat. Who doesn’t like a little extra fat?

Gluten-Free Flour

It’s no secret that I have a lot of gluten-free flours in my pantry. However, there are three that I use daily: oat and teff flours and potato starch. The three of these combine to make a great all purpose gluten-free baking flour. For these cookies, I combine 1/2 cup of oat flour (80g), 1/2 cup of teff flour (76g) and 1/4 cup of potato starch (84g).

Do you need to all these flours? No. You can use a gluten-free flour mix. You could use all oat flour. You could try almond flour. If you are not gluten-free, you can also use spelt, whole wheat or all purpose flour. If you are going to use a wheat flour, do not skip the resting period.

RECIPE

I think these cookies are half dough, half chopped chocolate.

90g brown butter (this is the amount of brown butter from one 1/2 cup, 113g stick)

55g (3 tbsp) tahini

10g (1 tbsp) olive oil

58g date syrup (you can use maple syrup too; 78g/.25c maple)

124g (1/2 cup) cane sugar (90g if you use coconut sugar)

4 egg yolks (71g)

1 tbsp water (you can add even more richness with milk or cream)

1 and 1/4 cups (233g) gluten-free flour mix (I make my own, use the mix you prefer)

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

14g (2 tbsp) milk powder

150g (about 2 cups) chocolate chips

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour mix, baking soda, salt and milk powder (if using). Set aside.

In a large bowl, combine the warm brown butter, tahini and olive oil. Mix together until smooth. Add the sugar (or coconut sugar) and syrup (date or maple; your cookie, your choice) and mix to combine.

Add the egg yolks and water and whisk vigorously until the mix starts to thicken slightly. What you are looking for is a shine to creep over the dough. Once you see that shine, add the dry ingredients to the egg-sugar-butter mixture and mix until almost totally combined.

Add the chocolate chunks and continue mixing until everything is mixed in (the flour should be fully absorbed). Cover the dough and chill for at least 1 hour. This is an important step, so don’t skip it. Throw it in the fridge, go do some yoga or play with your dog and then come back.

After the chill, preheat the oven to 375F and line a baking sheet with parchment. Use a 2 tablespoon cookie scoop (or two large spoons) to make dough balls. Drop on the baking sheet, leaving about 2 inches between each. This recipe will make about 10 large cookies, 18 smaller ones.

Bake for 13 to 15 minutes; do not over bake! It is better to leave these cookies a little underdone in the middle. Do not worry, the eggs will be cooked.

Let cool for 15 minutes before taking a bite, dunking it into a glass of milk or however you enjoy a cookie.

Tip: make yourself a few cookies, portion out the rest of the dough onto a parchment lined baking sheet. Freeze the dough overnight, throw in a resealable bag and you have cookie dough ready whenever you need a cookie.