Sometimes I have good ideas.

One of the things that I really like to do when I’m coming up with a recipe is turn stuff inside out. Put what’s normally on the inside on the outside.

If you have a good flavor combo, it keeps that combo but can give you really interesting, new textures.

Now that you’re kind of inside my brain, you can probably see how it’s not a huge leap to take a chocolate covered pretzel and flip it all around.

This cookie is the result and I think that it might be the best cookie I’ve ever made. I’m not going to go so far as to call it The Best Cookie EVER like so many people do, but I’ll just say that I would put it up against any other cookie in a taste test and leave it at that.

Pretzel Chip Cookies

Yield: 18 cookies

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 45 minutes

Ingredients:

8.5 ounces (a scant two cups) cake flour
8.5 ounces (1 2/3 cups) bread flour
1 1/4 Teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 Teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 Teaspoons kosher salt
1 1/4 Cups unsalted butter
1 Cup light brown sugar
1 1/2 Cups sugar
2 eggs
2 Teaspoons vanilla extract
1 pound chocolate chips, at least 60% cocoa
Hard pretzels, crushed

Helpful Equipment:
Kitchen Scale
Stand mixer or hand mixer

Directions:

1) Sift together flours with other dry ingredients except sugar.

2) Cream together sugar and butter until light and fluffy. Mix in eggs one at a time and vanilla.

3) Mix in dry ingredients and mix until just incorporated. Then fold in chocolate chips.

4) Cover dough with plastic wrap and let rest for 24 hours in the fridge.

5) When ready to bake cookies, preheat oven to 350 degrees.

6) Make 3.5 ounce balls of dough (a large golf ball). Press dough ball into crushed pretzels on top. Press on a lot of pretzels.

7) Add cookie to baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Six cookies should fit on each baking sheet.

8) Bake cookies for 18-20 minutes until lightly browned but still chewy on the inside.

9) Let cookies cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes, then transfer to rack to finish cooling.

Adapted from an NY Times Recipe.

The Flours

I’ve been eyeing the recipe that I adapted for these guys for a while. One of the things that intrigued me about it was how it ditches all-purpose flour for a mixture of cake flour and bread flour. I could see how that would give the cookies a soft texture but still be somewhat chewy which sounds like a winning cookie to me.

Interesting flour combo.

I usually don’t worry about weighing cookie ingredients, although I know I should, but for this recipe it seemed to call for a very exact ratio of cake flour and bread flour so I pulled out my digital scale.

Gotta weigh it!

As far as the chocolate goes, the article in the NY Times goes on and on about how to get the absolute perfect ratio of chocolate to dough and exactly what kinds of chips result in the best cookie.

I’m sure they are right, but I’m not really going to order chocolate off the internet just to make chocolate chips cookies. So I just picked up a few different kinds of chips that looked good to me and tossed them in.

Use a few different chips.

Making the Dough

This is a pretty standard cookie dough to make.

Start by sifting together the flours and other dry ingredients except the sugar. It is somewhat important to sift the flours here because cake flour can sometimes clump up pretty badly.

Then, using a mixer (hand or stand) beat together the sugar and butter until it’s a light, fluffy texture. Then mix in the eggs one at a time on low. Then add the vanilla.

Next, add the dry ingredients to the butter and sugar mixture and mix until the flour is incorporated. Mix on low and don’t over mix it or your cookies will get too chewy.

It should take under a minute to get your flour mixed in, then gently mix in your chocolate chips until they are evenly incorporated.

Don't over-mix it!

The Waiting

There was one part of the article that I was a bit skeptical about. They said that it’s very important to let your cookie dough rest in the fridge for at least 24 hours before baking your cookies.

This is a serious test of willpower. You have these delicious cookies just sitting there, but you have to wait.

The idea behind it is to give the dough plenty of time to absorb all the liquid. If you bake them right away, the flour won’t get a chance to even absorb the eggs.

I didn’t actually bake a cookie right away to compare, but I must say that the dough had a much different texture after sitting overnight.

So I think it’s worth it if you can stand the wait.

Once the dough is mixed, just cover it with plastic wrap and store it in the fridge overnight.

Patience people.

Forming the Cookies

When you’re finally ready to make the cookies, just scoop out about 3.5 ounces of cookie dough. I actually weighed mine to make sure it was right, but basically it should be the size of a large golfball.

This amount of dough makes a pretty enormous cookie. You can only fit six of them on a baking sheet at a time.

When each cookie is rolled into a ball, press it into some crushed pretzels on one side. Make sure a good amount of pretzels are stuck to the cookie.

Then add each cookie to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

Seriously large cookies

Bake these guys at 350 degrees for about 18 minutes. The cookies should be nicely browned on top, but still soft in the center.

These guys turned out so perfect.

Done deal.

Once they come out of the oven, let them cool on the baking sheet for five minutes and then transfer them to a cooling rack to finish cooling.

Serving them a bit warm is a really good idea.

I do not mess around.

Biting into one of these is a pretty intense experience. The salt from the pretzels is the perfect topping for the cookies. It really brings out the chocolate flavor in the cookies.

At the same time there’s this fantastic texture thing happening between the soft cookie and the crunchy pretzels.

This picture doesn’t really do it justice, but maybe it’ll give you an idea!

Chomp!

There’s a few tricky parts with this recipe and you could ignore them if you dare. You could not weigh or sift your flours. You could not let your dough sit for 24 hours. You could make wimpy little cookies. They would still be good.

But if you do take the time to follow some of the more annoying steps, you’ll be well-rewarded.

Pretzels. Chocolate. Cookies.

Is it the best chocolate chip cookie IN THE WORLD? I don’t know, but I definitely wouldn’t turn one down.

After I got back I just had to give homemade pretzels a shot. Turns out these were a huge success.

Well hello!

There’s really only two secrets to making a really good soft pretzel and we will get to both of them. One of them is kind of optional even. But let’s get down to business.

Homemade Pretzels

Yield: 8 Pretzels

Prep Time: 1 hour

Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes

Ingredients:

1 1/2 Cups warm water, 110 degrees or should be pretty warm to the touch.
1 Tablespoon sugar
2 Teaspoons kosher salt
2 1/4 Teaspoons active dry yeast (1 envelope)
22 ounces All-purpose flour, about 4.5 Cups
2 ounces unsalted butter, melted
Vegetable oil
15 Cups water
1 Cup baking soda
1 large egg
Pretzel salt

Directions:

1) Combine the water, sugar, salt and yeast into a bowl and let it sit for 5 minutes.

2) Mix in the melted butter and flour. If you have a mixer, just put on the dough hook and let it work until the dough comes together and pulls away from the sides of the bowl. It should form a soft ball after about 4 or 5 minutes.

3) Without a mixer, to simulate a dough hook, dip your hand in a cup of water every few minutes and use it to mix the dough vigorously. After a few minutes it comes together in a nice ball. This dough does not need to pass the windowpane test.

4) After 5 minutes or so of kneading, transfer the dough to a bowl that has been coated with vegetable oil and turn it a few times to coat the dough ball with oil. Cover it and let it sit at room temperature for 60 minutes to rise.

5) Take the dough and divide it evenly (a dough cutter is helpful here) into 8 pieces. Each piece should weigh about 4 ounces.

6) Roll the dough out into about a 2 foot strip, starting from the center and rolling out gently. If it isn’t stretching you can hold the dough by both ends and gently whip it up and down. It will loosen up the gluten a bit. Then take the left end and wrap it to the center and then overlay the right side. Then kind of adjust it so it's pretzel-like.

7) Bring the water and baking soda to a rolling boil and gently lay in a pretzel, one or two at a time. You’ll need a pretty good sized pot. The pretzel will float and after about 30 seconds, flip it over in the water with a spatula to get the other side. Then after another 30 gently lift it out and place it on a parchment lined baking sheet, ready to go for the oven.

8) Once the pretzels come out of the boil, brush them with some egg wash (1 egg and 1 Tablespoon water) and then sprinkle them generously with the pretzel salt.

9) Bake at 450 degrees for about 14 minutes.

10) Immediately move them to a cooling rack.

11) After they cool you can pile them high on a plate. Or eat them right away! I like mine with just a bit of mustard.

Recipe from Alton Brown.

Making the dough

This dough is pretty easy to pull together. Combine your water, sugar, salt and yeast into a bowl and let it sit for 5 minutes. It should start to foam as the yeast comes alive.

Froth and foam is good.

Then mix in your melted butter and flour. If you have a mixer, just put on the dough hook and let it work until the dough comes together and pulls away from the sides of the bowl. It should form a soft ball after about 4 or 5 minutes.

I, however, do not have a mixer, so I just mixed it by hand. To simulate a dough hook, I dip my hand in a cup of water every few minutes and use it to mix the dough vigorously. After a few minutes it comes together in a nice ball. This dough does not need to pass the windowpane test.

After 5 minutes or so of kneading, transfer the dough to a bowl that has been coated with vegetable oil and turn it a few times to coat the dough ball with oil. Cover it and let it sit at room temperature for 60 minutes to rise.

Should come out looking about like this.

After just an hour rise.

Shaping the Pretzels

Making these guys is not as hard as you might thing. Take your dough and divide it evenly (a dough cutter is helpful here) into 8 pieces. If you are anal like me you can weigh your dough before hand and then you’ll know that each piece should weigh about 4 ounces. Or you can just eyeball it.

In my opinion, there’s no need to do any fancy schmancy pretzel shaping. I like to do a very basic shape. Roll your dough out into about a 2 foot strip, starting from the center and rolling out gently. If it isn’t stretching you can hold the dough by both ends and gently whip it up and down. It will loosen up the gluten a bit.

Then take the left end and wrap it to the center and then overlay the right side. Then kind of adjust it so the pretzel looks like, well, a pretzel.

Make sense?

Boiling the pretzels

This is tip number one in making an awesome soft pretzel. Just like it is important to boil bagels, boiling the pretzels will give them a good texture and also let them get really browned in the oven.

Bring your water and baking soda to a rolling boil and gently lay in a pretzel, one or two at a time. You’ll need a pretty good sized pot. The pretzel will float and after about 30 seconds, flip it over in the water with a spatula to get the other side. Then after another 30 gently lift it out and place it on a parchment lined baking sheet, ready to go for the oven.

WARNING: When you add the baking soda to the boiling water, do so slowly. If you pour it all at once, it’ll explode. Think volcano science experiment….

Just like a bagel.

Your pretzels shouldn’t fall apart in the water, but if they do, just kind of reform the pretzel when it comes out of the water. Out of my 8, I had one pretzel that kind of fell apart, but it was pretty easy to reform it once I got it out of the water.

Pretzel salt

Tip two in making a good at-home pretzel is using the right salt. If you really want the pretzel like they have on the streets, you’ll need to buy some pretzel salt. It’s in larger granules than Kosher salt, but because it is just compacted salt, it dissolves really easily, filling your mouth with that familiar salty taste.

See the difference?

I think you could use Kosher salt or sea salt, but if you have the time it would be worth looking for some. I wasn’t able to find any in the grocery store, but it isn’t too expensive to order some online.

Once your pretzels come out of the boil, brush them with some egg wash (1 egg and 1 Tablespoon water) and then sprinkle them generously with the salt.

In my opinion, good salt makes a good pretzel.

These guys need to bake at 450 degrees for about 14 minutes. They should be golden brown when they come out. Immediately move them to a cooling rack.

All lined up.

After they cool you can pile them high on a plate.

Good lookin' plate.

Or eat them right away! I like mine with just a bit of mustard. If you wanted to go all out, you could even make some homemade mustard for these guys.

All it needs is a little mustard.

These turned out pretty perfect honestly. They were a bit crunchy but soft and bready on the inside. The salt was great and they were as fresh as you can get.

I can’t imagine a reason why you shouldn’t make these. They would make you some serious friends at a party.

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