Dean & Deluca!

The amazing Ilana sent me a wonderful Christmas present – Dean & Deluca cocoa powder – unfortunately due to our slow postal systems it only arrived yesterday but fortunately it came just as I was due a day off work, great timing or what?

Thank you, thank you, thank you Ilana for this lovely gift. 

Dean & Deluca is a chain of upscale grocery stores. The first one was established in New York City by Joel Dean and Giorgio DeLuca in September 1977. 

The store is reportedly a favourite of Nigella Lawson and it was with this in mind that I began to plan the cocoas unveiling.  As you can tell from my earlier posts this month I’ve made rather a lot of cakes, so cookies it had to be.  Chocolaty, gooey but crisp cookies. I toyed with the idea of the Chocolate Mint Cookies but I didn’t want the flavour of the D&D cocoa to be interfered with too much, for pure unadulterated chocolate, it had to be the Totally Chocolate, Chocolate Chip Cookies from Nigella Express (Nigella Lawson).

They weren’t the most attractive cookies but they were totally delicious.  Very moist and sticky under a crisp and crunchy coating, exactly as the ‘all American’ cookies should be, as opposed to the crisp and crunchy biscuit found in the UK.

The Recipe:

• 125g/4oz dark chocolate
• 150g/5¼oz plain flour
• 30g/1oz cocoa, sifted
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• ½ tsp salt
• 125g/4oz unsalted butter, softened
• 75g/2½oz light brown sugar
• 50g/2oz caster sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 free-range egg, cold from the fridge
• 350g/12¼oz dark chocolate chips

1. Preheat the oven to 170C/325F/Gas 3.
2. Break the 125g/4oz dark chocolate into pieces and place into a heatproof bowl set over a pan of barely simmering water. Heat, stirring occasionally, until melted. 
3. Place the flour, cocoa, bicarbonate of soda and salt into a large bowl and mix well. 
4. In another bowl, cream the butter and two sugars together until light and fluffy. Add the melted chocolate and stir well. 
5. Beat in the vanilla extract and crack in the egg, then mix in the dry ingredients. Finally stir in the chocolate chips. 
   Scoop out 12 equal portions of the mixture – an ice cream scoop and a palette knife are the best tools for the job – and place onto a lined baking sheet about 6cm/2½in apart. Do not flatten them. 
6. Transfer to the oven and bake for 18 minutes, then test with a skewer – it should come out semi-clean and not wet with batter. If you pierce a chocolate chip, try again. 
7. Leave the cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 4-5 minutes, then transfer them to a cooling rack to harden as they cool.

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