Giant Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Regular sized homemade cookies are always delicious, but they are never quite as visually impressive as the giant cookies on display in coffee shops and bakeries. While the true measure of a good cookie is in its flavor, it doesn’t hurt if the actual measurements of the cookie are as big as its taste.

And these are some very big cookies.

Each one is just about 6-inches in diameter and, as if their size weren’t impressive enough, they’re very tasty, too. The cookie recipe is easy to make and takes relatively few ingredients. In fact, it is a bit of a takeoff of the ever-popular Tollhouse chocolate chip cookie recipe – but then again, so are many chocolate chip cookie recipes. It uses lots of vanilla extract and brown sugar, along with a generous amount of chocolate chips and butter, so it is quite rich. The cookies spread a lot and end up being fairly thin and very chewy from all that brown sugar. For a large cookie, I think that this is a really good balance because with a thicker cookie you run the risk of it being either cakey from the addition of too much flour or simply far too filling to eat the whole thing at once (and I’m not one for eating half a cookie and then walking away).

As I said, these cookies spread out quite a bit as they bake, so be sure to leave about 6-inches between each 1/4-cup ball of dough. I baked only 3 or 4 cookies on each baking sheet. Fortunately, since the recipe only makes about 14 cookies, limiting the number on each sheet doesn’t mean that you’ll spend hours in front of the oven to get the whole batch baked.

I only used chocolate chips, but you can make these a bit more substantial by adding up to 3/4 cup of chopped, toasted nuts, as well. Try to get an even distribution when stirring chocolate chips or nuts into the cookie dough; since the cookies spread out a lot, you run the risk of having one cookie with only a couple of chips and one that is packed unless you pay a bit of attention when shaping the cookies. Worst case scenario, make sure you have a few extra chocolate chips on hand and just tuck them into the unbaked dough wherever you need them.

Giant Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
1 cup butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 300F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Whisk together dry ingredients – flour, baking soda and salt – in a medium bowl. In a large bowl, cream together butter and brown sugar until fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time, followed by the vanilla extract. Gradually beat in the flour mixture, mixing just until no streaks of flour remain. Stir in chocolate chips.
Use a 1/4 cup scoop to shape large balls of dough and place on prepared baking sheets. Leave about 6-inches between each cookie to allow for spread.
Bake for 16-19 minutes, until cookies are golden around the edges. Allow to cool on baking sheets for at least 5 minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool completely.

Makes about 14 large cookies