Pistachio, Brown Butter & Chocolate Chunk Cookies
It’s hard to beat the smell of brown butter by itself let alone once its in a cookie! These cookies have chunks of milk and dark chocolate and the king of the nuts, the mighty pistachio. You could use a different nut if you don’t have pistachios. Almonds, walnuts and hazelnuts would all be good here. I had a long, hard battle with myself over whether I should use pistachios or pine nuts. Will def do that one day.
Ingredients
(Makes 20 cookies)
200g butter, melted & browned
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup caster sugar
1 large egg
1 egg yolk
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
a pinch of salt
400g chocolate, chopped into large chunks (I use 50/50 dark and milk chocolate)
1/2 cup pistachio nuts, roughly chopped
Flakey sea salt to sprinkle
Prep It
Place butter in a medium pot on medium-high heat. Cook for 6-7 minutes swirling the pot often, until the butter is a deep golden brown colour. Once brown transfer to a large bowl and cool for about 10 minutes. Add brown sugar and caster sugar and mix well. Whisk in whole egg, yolk and vanilla until combined. Add flour, baking soda and salt and mix until just combined. Roughly chop chocolate into chunks. I like a good mixture of large chunks and fine shavings. Roughly chop pistachio nuts and stir through cookie dough along with chocolate. Roll into golf ball size balls and flatten so you end up with 1.5cm thick disks. Place on a baking paper lined oven tray and pop in the fridge to harden for about 30 minutes (you could go longer, I couldn’t wait).
Cook It
Preheat oven to 165°C. Spread the cookies out on baking trays with about 4cm in between each cookie to allow for spreading. Bake 1 tray at a time on the middle oven rack for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes remove from oven and tap the tray against the bench to flatten cookies. Return to oven to cook for 2-3 minutes longer, until cookies are golden brown and puffed. Remove from oven, give it another tap and sprinkle over sea salt. Cool on tray for about 5 minutes. They will still look a little soft at this stage but as they cool on the tray they will set making for a rich fudgy center.