Brown Butter Banana Bread Chocolate Chip Cookies
Luscious, gooey-in-the-middle brown butter chocolate chip cookies with a banana twist, making them taste like a combination of your favorite chocolate chip cookie and a slice of freshly baked, still-warm banana bread.
Yield: about 12 cookies
Ingredients
- ½ cup / 113 g salted butter, ideally European-style
- 2 teaspoons / 9 g dry milk powder, optional
- ½ cup / 106 g packed light brown sugar
- ¼ cup / 50 g granulated sugar
- 1 large egg yolk, at room temperature
- ⅓ cup / 85 g mashed banana, from 1 small very ripe banana
- ½ teaspoon vanilla paste, or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cups / 190 g all-purpose flour
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon fine sea salt, increase to 3/4 teaspoon if using unsalted butter
- ½ teaspoon instant espresso powder, optional
- ¾ cup / 125 g chocolate chips or coarsely chopped chocolate, I use a mix of 70% dark and 50% semisweet chocolate chips
Instructions
- To brown butter, combine butter and dry milk powder in a small saucepan over medium heat, until butter melts and starts to simmer and sputter (it will foam up quite a bit). Continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until the sputtering ceases and the butter solids on the bottom start to turn golden brown. Remove from heat and immediately pour into a heat-proof mixing bowl, scraping all the browned bits from the pan, and set aside to cool slightly (below 100 degrees F).
- Add brown sugar and sugar to the mixing bowl with the lukewarm butter and stir until evenly moistened.
- Add egg yolk and mix well with a whisk or spatula until smooth and emulsified. Mix in banana and vanilla.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and espresso powder until evenly incorporated. Add to the wet ingredients and gently mix just nearly incorporated, with just a few streaks of dry flour remaining. Fold in chocolate chips until evenly distributed.
- At this point the dough will be very soft. I recommend chilling for 15-20 minutes first to make it easier to handle, but I still like to shape the dough while it's still fairly soft.
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line your baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Scoop dough into 60 grams balls (a scant large cookie scoop) and arrange on prepared cookie sheet, leaving about 2 inches of of space between cookies.
- Bake for 11 to 13 minutes or until tops are puffed, center is no longer raw-looking, and the edges have slightly darkened to a golden brown.
- Immediately upon removing from the oven, swirl a round cookie cutter around the cookies to tuck in the edges and make them perfectly circular. You can also press a few chocolate chips on top while the cookies are still hot to make for truly picture perfect cookies.
- Let cool on cookie sheet for 15 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Cookies will keep in an airtight container for up to 5 days, refrigerated for up to a week, or in a zip-top bag in the freezer for up to 2 months.