The Sandpoint Eater: Cocoa loco

By Marcia Pilgeram
Reader Columnist

In a feeble attempt at downsizing, I devoted much time this week to more cookbook purging. The last time I downsized my cookbook collection, I gave away a couple hundred cookbooks. Now I’m down to 600, and it’s still too many. It’s a time-consuming project, settling beside a shelf and browsing through a well-worn book. It’s a lot of trips down memory lane that invariably involve a few false starts and detours. 

On my shelves are at least 50 books devoted entirely to chocolate in numerous categories. Some are dedicated to baking; others are professional cookbooks purchased over the years when I attended various chocolate-making classes (including courses at the renowned French Pastry School in Chicago). Others are more detailed and scientific, diving deep into specific gravity and precision techniques for tempering and molding chocolate (if you read Brenden Bobby’s column, “Mad About Science: Chocolate,” in the May 17 edition of the Reader, you can learn about the science involved in chocolate making).

A couple of years ago, I did a house swap with a young couple and their adorable young son, Arlo. Karma delivered them from a brownstone in Brooklyn to my front door in Ponderpoint. Kia is a high fashion jewelry designer (Harry Winston and Van Cleef & Arpels), and her husband Michel is a Swiss chocolate distributor who kept me in top-shelf samples of high-end chocolate for months. 

Who doesn’t love chocolate? As a devoted consumer, connoisseur, baker and candy maker, I’ve always been a fan. Few pleasures are as satisfying to me as a small square of rich chocolate, melting against my tongue. When I travel, it’s my favorite snack and gift-giving commodity. Once I’m at an international airport and headed home, you’ll find me zipping into duty-free to convert the last of my local currency into chocolate.

At any given time, a vast cache of chocolate is stored in my bedroom closet, where it’s dark and cool. I have baking chocolate from Spain, bags (and bags) of little Lindt Swiss bars, various flavors of Butlers Irish bars and several varieties of South American chocolate I picked up on a recent trip to Argentina. 

On another recent trip, I was transiting at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam (I’m always pleased when it’s my transit airport returning home because I can also grab some good gouda cheeses). I was dazed by a floor-to-ceiling display of Tony’s Chocolonely. The company was named in reference to the founder’s feeling that he was the only person interested in eradicating slavery in the cocoa industry. I’m a big fan of their corporate philosophy, so naturally, I picked up a few bars to add to the closet collection. The bars are unevenly divided in the packages to symbolize the unequal distribution of incomes in the chocolate industry.  

Since opening an international office in Portland, Ore., their chocolate is widely available in the U.S., and you can find an assortment of Tony’s at either Yoke’s or Winter Ridge. My favorite is their 70% extra dark chocolate bar, perfect for snacking and baking, especially when chopped up and mixed with chocolate chips for cookies.

We can give (big) thanks to Ruth Wakefield for creating the first chocolate chip cookie. In a moment of culinary inspiration, Wakefield, who ran the Toll House Inn in Whitman, Mass., cut up some bars of chocolate and added them to a basic sugar cookie recipe. The rest is history; today, there are dozens of recipes for the iconic chocolate chip cookie. 

Some people have a knack for making perfect chocolate chip cookies. And I give due credit to my oldest child Ryanne and my neighbor Rachel, whom I’ve hired occasionally to bake for me when I need a batch of cookies for grandkids (shhh!). Both of them whip up blue ribbon-worthy traditional cookies. 

But in another category, I think my oozy-gooey, triple chocolate cookie is certainly blue ribbon-worthy, too, and my gaggle of grandchildren all agree!

Triple chocolate cookies • These cookies scream chocolate. The recipe calls for a whole tablespoon of vanilla (a lot of chocolate and a lot of vanilla)! Don’t over bake these gooey bad boys! Makes 4 dozen.

Ingredients

• 2 sticks (8 oz) unsalted butter, softened

• 1 cup dark brown sugar

• ⅔ cup fine granulated white sugar (pulse in processor before measuring)

• 2 large eggs

• 1 tbs vanilla

• 2 ½ cups flour

• ½ cup unsweetened dark chocolate cocoa (Miller’s Country Store).

• 1 tsp baking soda

• 1 tsp salt

• 8 oz of 70% dark chocolate bar, chopped fine (I like Tony’s)

• 1 c semisweet chocolate chips*

Directions

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt. Set aside. 

Using a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter, brown and white sugars on medium speed for about 2 minutes. Scrape the sides of the bowl with a spatula. Add eggs one at a time, mixing until fluffy. Add the vanilla and blend in at medium speed. 

With the mixer on low, slowly add in dry ingredients. Mix just until combined (don’t overmix!). Fold in chopped chocolate and chocolate chips by hand. 

Cover mixing bowl with cling wrap and chill in the fridge for an hour or so (or overnight).

Remove dough from fridge, preheat oven to 375 degrees F, and roll dough into 48 1-inch balls. Place 12 on each of two baking pans lined with parchment paper. Bake for 9-11 minutes. Remove from oven. Do not overbake! 

Allow cookies to cool on pans for about 10 minutes, then loosen with metal spatula and place on cooling rack. Bake second batch. When cooled completely, transfer to an airtight container — they keep well for 2-3 days. Or freeze in storage containers for up to a month.