Best Chocolate Chip Cookie’s Ever (after my brother’s recipe)

When I was growing up, my little brother was always the cookie maker in the house. Whenever someone wanted chocolate chip cookies, we would call Riley. It was just kind of his thing, whether he wanted it or not. He just made really good chocolate chip cookies. They were really good, but the other day I was hankering for some chocolate chip cookies, and I didn’t have my little brother (who is now all grown up and tough and in the army) to make some for me. See, he just had a way with the cookies. Everyone else who made his recipe didn’t quite have the same turn out. I wanted to find an amazing cookie recipe that didn’t require my brother’s magic touch.
I adapted this recipe from Baking Illustrated (pg. 434) and it is the perfect formula for a big bakery style cookie. There are a couple things that make the perfect chocolate chip cookie:

• melted butter
• extra egg yolk
• brown sugar and white sugar
• a little bit of cornstarch
• not over baking
• cooling the cookies on the pan, instead of a cooling rack

Perfect, chewy, big, soft, bakery window cookies.
PRINTABLE RECIPE
Ingredients:

• 2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp.  cornstarch
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 12 TBSP. (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled until warm
• 1 cup packed light or dark brown sugar
• 1/2 cup  granulated sugar
• 1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1-1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 325 F. Mix together flour, baking soda, corn starch, and salt in a medium bowl.
2. In an electric mixer, beat together the butter and sugars until combined. Add the egg, yolk, and vanilla. Beat until combined and slightly fluffy.
3. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix until just combined.
4. Stir in as many chocolate chips as you want.
5. Prepare baking pans by lining them with parchment paper or silpat or spray with baking spray. Roll just under a 1/4 cup dough into a ball. Pull apart, turn so the jagged edges are facing upward, and push back together leaving the jagged edges facing upwards. This makes the tops all pretty and kind of bumpy like bakery cookies. Or you could just use on of those handy dandy cookie dough scoopers.
.
6. Space them 2 1/2 inches apart on the pan and bake for 14 minutes.  I know its hard, but take them out right as the edges start to firm up, even though the middle is still doughy. It will probably look underdone, but it will continue to cook after you take them out of the oven. Do not over cook, or these wont be the worlds best chocolate chip cookies. Make sure you leave the cookies to cool right on the pan, not on a cooling rack. This will make the texture just perfect.

C is for cookie.
Recipe adapted from Baking Illustrated