Set It & Forget It
This Slow-Cooker Chocolate Chip Cookie Should Be Served With Nothing but Spoons
This week's Set It & Forget It recipe from Rebecca Firkser: a giant party piece.
Welcome to Set It & Forget It, a series about all the ways we rely on our slow cookers, Instant Pots, and ovens during the colder months. Whether it’s a long braise on the stove or a quick burst in the pressure cooker, one thing’s for sure: Comfort food means comfort cooking.
A freshly baked chocolate chip cookie is truly all I ever want at the end of the day. And I imagine that when I have people over for dinner, it’s all they want to finish off the meal as well. Of course, dessert fresh out of the oven can present a problem if you’re already using your oven to make dinner. Enter: the slow cooker.
Not just for gently cooked soups or low-and-slow roasts, a slow cooker can be used to bake one enormous cookie. Just like the cookie cakes you might find at an elementary school birthday party, this cookie can be cooled and cut into wedges or bars, or (even more fun) eaten whole, like spoonbread.
Technically “baking cookies” in a slow cooker is a misnomer. You’ll need not turn on the oven nor dirty your cookie scoop, nor pull out your sheet pans. Just line the bowl of the cooker with parchment paper, grease it, then spread around the thick batter.
Otherwise, this recipe is fairly standard: flour, sugar, butter, eggs, and vanilla. There’s an extra yolk for added moistness—though the final texture of this cookie is more akin to a cakey blondie than crispy Tate’s or chewy Toll House cookies. When it comes to chocolate, I’m partial to dark (at least 60 percent), but you can use whatever you like.
Set the slow cooker on high for 2 hours or on low for 4 hours. If you’re going for the whole-cookie-and-spoons presentation, turn off the cooker at this point to let the dough set just a bit before transferring it to a plate and serving with nothing but flatware—for digging in with no hesitation. Of course, you could be civilized and cut the cookie into slices and serve it like a cake, as well. The world is your slow-cooker chocolate chip cookie.
Serving it with ice cream, however, is nonnegotiable.
| 2 1/4 | cups all-purpose flour |
| 1 | teaspoon baking soda |
| 1 | teaspoon kosher salt |
| 3/4 | cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature |
| 3/4 | cup dark brown sugar (or 3/4 cup light brown sugar + 2 teaspoons molasses) |
| 1/4 | cup granulated sugar |
| 2 | eggs, at room temperature |
| 1 | egg yolk, at room temperature |
| 2 | teaspoons vanilla extract |
| 1 | cup roughly chopped bittersweet chocolate (or whatever chocolate you prefer in cookies) |
| Flaky sea salt | |
| Vanilla ice cream, for serving (optional) |
| 2 1/4 | cups all-purpose flour |
| 1 | teaspoon baking soda |
| 1 | teaspoon kosher salt |
| 3/4 | cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature |
| 3/4 | cup dark brown sugar (or 3/4 cup light brown sugar + 2 teaspoons molasses) |
| 1/4 | cup granulated sugar |
| 2 | eggs, at room temperature |
| 1 | egg yolk, at room temperature |
| 2 | teaspoons vanilla extract |
| 1 | cup roughly chopped bittersweet chocolate (or whatever chocolate you prefer in cookies) |
| Flaky sea salt | |
| Vanilla ice cream, for serving (optional) |
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