Recipe: Chocolate (Chip) Lava Cookies

Yum. Here, as promised, is the scrumptious recipe with which I broke in my new KitchenAid! It was a fitting recipe for many reasons, but mostly for my two favourite standbys: it was easy and it was delicious.

Now, you may be wondering why I've entitled this recipe "Chocolate (Chip) Lava Cookies." I mean, what's up with those parentheses? Well, believe it or not, I am *ahem* sometimes not that careful when I read recipes. And I missed the part where it says only melt a portion of the chocolate chips that the recipe calls for. I melted the whole bag, which also happened to be the last bag of chocolate chips in the house. *sigh*. So my Chocolate Chip Lava Cookies were destined to be chipless.

Ah well. The first step in this as in so many recipes is to cream together the butter and sugars (brown and white) until nice and fluffy. Enter my new mixer. Handled it's first task like a dream. See?

Look at that mixing action! Anyways, then you add in your egg and your vanilla and beat thoroughly. Then it's time to add your dry ingredients (flour, salt, baking soda -- not powder, which I almost added by mistake because I wasn't paying attention!!) and mix until just combined. The mixture will start to form a kind of crumbly dough, like so:

Now comes the fun part! Split the batter/dough in half and set one half aside. Pat about a heaping tablespoon of the dough into the bottom of each greased cup in your muffin pan until you've used up half the batter. Then give each cookie a good dose of melted chocolate. Finally, use the rest of the dough to cover over each cookie.

When you're done covering over the chocolate, fire the pan in the oven for about 15-20 minutes. When the cookies are golden brown, remove from oven and run a knife around the edges of each to help ease the removal.

Serve warm topped with ice cream and any left over melted chocolate. Or just devour them right away. Both are good options.

Here's the full recipe, found originally here:

Chocolate Chip Lava Cookies

Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
1/2 Tbsp vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 (11.5 oz) bag milk chocolate chips, divided

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease a standard size muffin tin. Place 1/2 cup chocolate chips in a Ziploc bag and seal shut. Lay the Ziploc bag flat in the microwave, spreading out the chocolate chips in a single layer. Microwave for 30 seconds. Remove bag and flip, microwaving for an additional 10-15 seconds until all the chips are softened. Set aside to cool.

2. With an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugars until light and fluffy, about 3-5 minutes. Add egg and vanilla and beat until well combined. Meanwhile, in a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, salt and baking soda. Add to the wet ingredients and beat on low speed until just combined. Add the remaining chocolate chips (1 cup) and stir to combine.

3. Using half the cookie dough, scoop 1.5-2 tbsp of dough, flatten it out a bit, and place in the bottom of the muffin tin. Repeat for a total of 10 cookies. Cut a small tip in the corner of the Ziploc bag and gently squeeze a layer of chocolate over the cookie. Scoop and flatten the remaining dough and place on top of the chocolate layer. Bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes, until the edges are just browned. As soon as they come out of the oven, run a knife around the edges to make for easy removing later.

Recipe: Chocolate Chip Macadamia Nut Muffins

I have one word for these muffins: scrumptious. Scrumptious, scrumptious, scrumptious. I discovered this recipe about two months ago I'd say, and I've made it at least 5 times. And every time the entire batch disappears in like a day. Maybe a day and a half if we're not feeling particularly snackish in our house on that particular day. I've modified the recipe slightly to make the muffins lighter than the original, which I found here.

Anyways, your first step is easy. Turn on the oven to 350 degrees and either grease a muffin tray or line it with muffin cups.

In one bowl, combine the dry ingredients. In another, whisk together the egg and sugar. Then slowly mix in the melted butter and sour cream. The finished mixture should look something like this:

Next, add the chocolate chips and chopped macadamia nuts to the liquids and toss to coat. Fun fact that I learned from my grandmother: you can freeze macadamia nuts to keep them fresh until you need them.

Once you've mixed in the chocolate and nuts, then it's time to add the dry ingredients. The important thing here is not to overmix it. A few lumps are still fine when you're done. If you stick to the original recipe, these muffins turn out quite dense, so I like to add an extra 1/4 cup of milk or so at this stage, but that's up to you. The finished batter should look something like this:

Spoon the batter into the muffin cups, making sure to distribute the batter as evenly as possible. I find this recipe usually makes about a dozen very large muffins or 15-16 smaller muffins. It's up to you and the size of your muffin tray. :)

Throw the muffins in the oven for about 20-25 minutes, or until they're slightly golden brown on the top. These muffins are pretty pale even when they're cooked through. You don't want to overdo it!

Pull them out of the oven, and enjoy them fresh and warm when the chocolate chips are still melted. Mmmmmmm.

Here's the full recipe:

Chocolate Chip Macadamia Nut Muffins:


Ingredients:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt (if you use salted macadamia nuts, omit the salt)
1 egg
1 cup sugar
1/4 unsalted butter, melted
1 1/4 cups sour cream
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 cup macadamia nuts, chopped coarsely
1/4 cup milk (optional)

Directions;

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a muffin pan or line with muffin cups. Set aside.

2. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl; set aside.

3. In a large bowl, whisk the egg until combined, about 20 seconds. Add the sugar and whisk until the mixture is thick and thoroughly combined. Slowly whisk the butter into the mixture until combined. Add half the sour cream, whisking until just combined, repeat with the remaining sour cream.

4. Add the chocolate chips and macadamia nuts to the flour mixture and toss to coat.

5. Add the flour to the sour cream mixture and fold with a spatula until combined and the chips and nuts are evenly distributed, but do not overmix.

6. Evenly divide the batter in between the cups of the muffin pan. Bake for 20-23 minutes, or until very light golden brown colour and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Transfer the muffins to a wire cooling rack and allow to cool for at least 10 minutes before serving.