Miso, Rye & Hazelnut Dark Chocolate Cookies

Chocolate chunk cookies are the sort of strange entity where there have been millions (probably) tested and written about and yet there still seems to be room to squeeze a few more in. Something to do with the number of variables that can be adjusted – crispy, flat, chewy, soft, dense, buttery, sweet; the number of possible flavours – classic chocolate might be your favourite, but what about sesame, orange, espresso or walnut?; and the infinite ways you could combine butter, brown and white sugar, egg, flour and raising agents to achieve this. It’s also probably because they’re one of the simplest, most versatile baked goods you can make – what else is quick and easy, a guaranteed crowd-pleaser, handheld and can be thrown around in a container on the way to work/school/picnic and arrive hardly worse for wear, no forks or paper towels required? Even brownies are trickier – dry and cakey happens all too often. I debated for a while what I could possibly have to add to the chocolate chunk cookie conversation, until a photograph of mine reposted by Food52 recently sparked a flurry of recipe requests. Apparently you wanted another recipe too.

These are miso, rye and hazelnut dark chocolate cookies. Not classic, but thick and chewy in the centre, nutty with rye flour and toasted hazelnuts with a slightly savoury saltiness of miso, more chocolate than cookie in places. Rich as hell but also not too sweet. The miso isn’t overwhelming but somehow makes the cookie dough especially addictive, even more than usual. Flaky sea salt on top is essential. As per most cookies, they’re at their textural best the day of baking, but last well for a few days afterwards (and you could always revive them for a few minutes in the oven to recreate those chocolate puddles). A few notes on them below:

• Good quality dark chocolate is essential. I use Whittaker’s 72% chopped into chunks – you don’t need to stick to this, but please don’t just use baking aisle chocolate chips.
• The dough needs to be refrigerated for an hour before baking or they spread too much. You can refrigerate it for up to a couple of days, but leave them out on the counter for half an hour or so to soften a little before you bake them if possible. You could also freeze excess dough once scooped into balls, then bake straight from frozen.
• I use the pan-banging method as popularised by Sarah Kieffer of the Vanilla Bean Blog – it helps to create flatter, crisper edges while retaining a gooey cookie centre as the cookie dough ripples out when you bang the cookie tray down. It also helps with those pools of molten chocolate.