Forget this guide because their control recipe is less than perfect. This recipe is perfect. Fight me. I didn’t perfect it, America’s Test Kitchen did. Kudos to them.
I call this recipe perfect, not only because it makes the exact kind of cookie I crave, but because it can go from stored ingredients to finished cookie in the time it takes to prepare (without the hassle of softening butter) and it will make your house smell heavenly the entire time.
Buy good (and fresh) ingredients, you can’t make perfect cookies with rubbish ingredients.
Perfect Browned Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
INGREDIENTS
1-3/4 cups (210g) unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 (3g) teaspoon baking soda
14 tablespoons (197g) unsalted butter
1/2 cup (99g) granulated sugar
3/4 cups (160g) packed dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon (9g) table salt
2 teaspoons (11.2g) vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1-1/4 cups (296mL) semisweet chocolate chips
3/4 cup (177mL) chopped pecans or chopped toasted walnuts (optional)
PREPARATION Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 375 degrees. Line 2 large (18- by 12-inch) baking sheets with parchment paper. Whisk flour and baking soda together in medium bowl; set aside.
Heat 10 tablespoons (140g) butter in 10-inch skillet over medium-high heat until melted, about 2 minutes. Continue cooking, swirling pan constantly until butter is dark golden brown and has nutty aroma, 1 to 3 minutes. Remove skillet from heat and, using heatproof spatula, transfer browned butter to large heatproof bowl.
Stir remaining 4 tablespoons butter into hot butter until completely melted. Add both sugars, salt, and vanilla to bowl with butter and whisk until fully incorporated. Add egg and yolk and whisk until mixture is smooth with no sugar lumps remaining, about 30 seconds. Let mixture stand 3 minutes, then whisk for 30 seconds. Repeat process of resting and whisking 2 more times until mixture is thick, smooth, and shiny. Using rubber spatula or wooden spoon, stir in flour mixture until just combined, about 1 minute. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts (if using), giving dough final stir to ensure no flour pockets remain.
Divide dough into 16 portions, each about 3 tablespoons (or use #24 cookie scoop). Arrange 2 inches apart on prepared baking sheets, 8 dough balls per sheet. (Smaller baking sheets can be used, but will require 3 batches.)
Bake cookies 1 tray at a time until cookies the edges have begun to set but centers are still soft, 10 to 14 minutes, rotating baking sheet halfway through baking.
Transfer baking sheet to wire rack; cool cookies completely before serving.
Give these cookies away. Seriously, they are too delicious. Your waistline and your neighbors will thank you. Just don’t give any cookies to the ignorant fucks whining about units. They got the conversion all wrong anyway.
I hear that people like US recipes because they don’t use exact metrics and instead use spoons and cups and those are supposedly easier to scale. In baking I absolutely hate that. Give me metric units. I have no problems scaling those up or down as required. What’s a cup? I have .2 liter cups and .4 liter. How the fuck is that supposed to be easier? And what’s up with tablespoons of butter? Depending on how much you put on a spoon that can easily mean double/half as much butter. With grams and liters there is no doubt and no second-guessing.
A cup in US Customary is 237 ml (often rounded to 240 ml). Americans don’t exist in a world where they have to play “is this cup US Customary or different measure also calling itself a cup measure?” as all their measuring cups are going to be in US Customary. Butter usually comes in quarter pound sticks with teaspoon (4.9 ml) and tablespoon (14.8 ml) measures printed on the wrapper so you can just cut a hunk of the appropriate volume from the stick and if you were using a measuring spoon to measure butter you’d use a level measure to create consistency and not just let it heap up.
Note: I prefer weighing ingredients and in metric at that. I’m just answering your questions.
Weighing ingredients is so much better. I can cook significantly faster when I don’t have to measure volumetrically, plus recipes scale so much more easily. If I want to make 3.134 of a recipe, weight is the way to go.
Oh, I agree. If I use a recipe regularly I’ll often convert it or if I’m creating one from scratch I’ll usually just have everything by weight from get go.
P.S. Nothing makes me annoyed at a recipe faster than seeing something like 2.5 cups of chopped broccoli.
This is very close to the “perfect” recipe I use from Tasty. But they add in a little bit of espresso powder. It’s not enough to make the cookies taste like coffee, but it does make the chocolate flavor more intense. I really like this recipe, but now I want to try the ATK recipe and see which one is better because I swear by the Tasty recipe ever since I found it. Here it is if anyone’s curious: tasty.co/…/tasty-101-ultimate-brown-butter-chocol…
Edit: I am actually not sure about the amount of butter. Another table I found would give the amount as about 400g, which is insane. That would make this just butter with sugar and some stuff to keep it all together. But on the other hand that does sound very American.
The recipe translated for the mentally sane:
Perfect Browned Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
INGREDIENTS
<span style="color:#323232;">~150g unbleached all-purpose flour
</span><span style="color:#323232;">1/2 teaspoon baking soda
</span><span style="color:#323232;">200g unsalted butter
</span><span style="color:#323232;">100g granulated sugar
</span><span style="color:#323232;">150g packed dark brown sugar
</span><span style="color:#323232;">1 teaspoon table salt
</span><span style="color:#323232;">2 teaspoons vanilla extract
</span><span style="color:#323232;">1 large egg
</span><span style="color:#323232;">1 large egg yolk
</span><span style="color:#323232;">100g semisweet chocolate chips
</span><span style="color:#323232;">100g chopped pecans or chopped toasted walnuts (optional)
</span>
PREPARATION Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 190 degrees. Line 2 large (30-45cm) baking sheets with parchment paper. Whisk flour and baking soda together in medium bowl; set aside.
Heat 150g butter in 25cm skillet over medium-high heat until melted, about 2 minutes. Continue cooking, swirling pan constantly until butter is dark golden brown and has nutty aroma, 1 to 3 minutes. Remove skillet from heat and, using heatproof spatula, transfer browned butter to large heatproof bowl.
Stir remaining 50g butter into hot butter until completely melted. Add both sugars, salt, and vanilla to bowl with butter and whisk until fully incorporated. Add egg and yolk and whisk until mixture is smooth with no sugar lumps remaining, about 30 seconds. Let mixture stand 3 minutes, then whisk for 30 seconds. Repeat process of resting and whisking 2 more times until mixture is thick, smooth, and shiny. Using rubber spatula or wooden spoon, stir in flour mixture until just combined, about 1 minute. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts (if using), giving dough final stir to ensure no flour pockets remain.
Divide dough into 16 portions, each about 3 tablespoons (or use #24 cookie scoop). Arrange 5cm apart on prepared baking sheets, 8 dough balls per sheet. (Smaller baking sheets can be used, but will require 3 batches.)
Bake cookies 1 tray at a time until cookies the edges have begun to set but centers are still soft, 10 to 14 minutes, rotating baking sheet halfway through baking.
Transfer baking sheet to wire rack; cool cookies completely before serving.
One cup of flour weighs less than one cup of sugar and different kinds of sugar also have different mass. And I rounded up or down to be in line with usual recipe amounts. But what I saw from the ranges given by helpful people here and what I found online, these vague recipes can fuck a rake. A fucking tablespoon of butter alone can be anything from 10 to 40 gram. With 14 tablespoons that gives you a range from 140g to 560g. That’s insanity.
That’s why it’s just easier to work in the original units of the recipe instead of needlessly converting it for nor real benefit. We’re making a single batch of cookies, not bread for an army or drugs; SI units and excessive precision just don’t matter that much. The recipe isn’t vague, just your understanding. A tablespoon isn’t a vague measurement, you’re just trying to adapt it to a needlessly precise unit of measure and forgetting everything your maths and sciense teachers should have taught you about significant digits.
A tablespoon as measurement for a non-fluid is extremely vague. How much mass do you pile onto it? There’s an extremely wide range of possibilities.
Also, this entire discussion under a post about how much different amounts of ingredients affect the outcome is just rich. Your recipe could be all of the examples in OP’s picture, depending on how people interpret it. If you treat baking recipes as art, sure, your recipe is great. If you want reproducible outcomes across different people it’s useless.
Unless you live in an extremely remote place not served by roads. The arctic for example. It’s not technically commuting as in going to and from your 9 to 5, but plenty of small northern communities are still completely dependent on small gravel runways or even bushplanes for things like going to the doctor or dentist, or really anything they need to go to a city for, which is a lot of things.
I actually thought this was a similar situation, that they’re so out in the middle of nowhere flying is significantly more convenient than driving. But then I took a look at the map and realized that they’re not far from Chicago and are within easy driving distance from nearby smaller towns, which makes this way harder to justify though still mildly interesting.
One of the first things my instructor told me was “I hope you’re getting your license for fun or a job, and not planning on commuting. Eventually you’ll get stuck somewhere due to the weather.”
Heavy, powerful commercial jets have deicing systems. They also have the benefit of an entire team of air traffic controllers on takeoff and landing – and they still get grounded by weather. Small planes are grounded by such inclement weather as “fog”, “thunderstorms”, “high winds”, and “low cloud cover”.
Why not? Less risk of being hit by a plane if they’re in the sky and requirements for a pilot license are much stricter. In a plane crash occupants are more likely to die than innocent bystanders, compared to cars that are designed for safety only for those on the inside.
I dunno, I was supposed to get 100hrs of driving experience in order to get my license. Meanwhile the minimum required for a PPL is 40, and only 20 of that is required to be with an instructor. You can get away with fewer if you are just getting a Light Sport license, and an Ultralight requires no license at all (seriously though, get training).
Don’t forget that many small propeller driven aircraft run on leaded gas, and it’s a formulation of leaded gas that has 10x the lead that motor fuel used to.
Worth noting that the amount of aviation fuel burned annually should make it a negligible contributer to environmental lead contamination compared to widespread automotive use (although I’m sure it contributes on airport grounds).
Edit: All the pilots I know want to use unleaded, and it was recently approved after being stuck in a bureaucratic nightmare process, but market forces may make it hard to adopt.
But, didn’t you hear the Midgley guy who invented TEL like 100 years ago? You can safely breathe it and even wash your hands in it! (said right after he got lead poisoning)
That was a great watch - it’s cool to find out the history.
I must say, society is much better off without widespread use of TEL, but as someone who used to do racecar things, TEL works like magic. A little goes a LONG way, and Midgely did legitimately stumble upon something with very high effect for the concentration (they also touch on ethanol in the video which has the drawback of needing a lot).
I’m not opposed to using it in a small scale racing context (like definitely not NASCAR) because it’s so fucking useful and the quantity is unlikely to cause harm. Unfortunately so much bad has been done with it at this point, I don’t think that’s a very popular opinion.
Whatever your views on it, it’s the only thing that can make gasoline legitimately 120+ octane, and that has huge implications for some types of racing.
Piston driven planes still do use leaded gasoline. There is a very recent push to certify lead free avgas and progress is being made but they’re being a bit opaque and seemingly rushing it which is making a lot of people weary of it.
Planes that would land here typically use 100LL which contains lead. (LL stands for Low Lead). It’s not banned for aviation use.
There has been a push recently to use alternatives which don’t contain lead but most places still have 100LL as it’s a very long process to get things certified for aviation use.
You’re only taking into account pollution and i bet you with the barrier of entry and cost accounted there would be less pollution from flying compared to driving.
It’s quite simple really. Less people would be able to fly, so those that can’t will just stand still in confusion until they die from starvation. The remaining population would be the small fraction who were able to afford to fly. Net loss in pollution.
I think they’re trying to say that less people would fly than currently drive due to the cost of flying. Although, if we subsidized personal planes at the same rate that we do personal vehicles I’m not entirely sure that flying would continue to be so expensive.
Plane pollution is not that much worse than a car. Depending on what metric you measure it can be better (planes are more fuel efficient and thus less CO2. Small planes like the picture generally use lead fuel and old engine designs that pollute more) on long trips.
No, planes are not more fuel efficient, even driving alone a car. The reason why it costs more to go by car is due to many reasons, especially the higher cost of fuel at petrol stations.
Yes, some light planes have fuel economy similar to efficient cars (which is very impressive considering how fast they are relative to cars). If you consider the advantages of direct, straight line routing, it’s not hard for planes to do better on fuel economy.
We’re not talking about jets here, though some of those do very well in mpg on a per passenger basis.
Nearly all land near small runways and airports that fly planes using AvGas will have lead contamination. That’s because lead is still used in most aviation fuels a consumer plane would use. Runways are also required to have and use PFAS in firefighting foam for emergencies. Training and system tests will dump that stuff in the surrounding area.
Unless these fine folks have A380s they’re paying a hefty premium for lead exposure and PFAS in their water and soil.
Lead is only one factor of pollution though. You will note that i acknowledged it exists. There is no objective way to say what is the most important factor or how you compare them.
Cycling has carbon emissions if you factor the additional calorie intake needed to power your bike. :| Which will vary widely depending on your size, diet, and food source. Is it still a more sustainable form of transportation? Probably, but maybe not in extreme cases (like a 300-lb person eating beef daily flown in from the other side of the planet, versus, a tiny two seater electric car power off of solar energy, using batteries sourced from recycled materials) and it certainly isn’t 0 impact.
Also, for extra pedantism, carbon emission are not pollution (in the sense that it doesn’t poison the life forms directly), but it is a GHG which causes harm to the environment too.
If you factor calorie intake of the bike rider you need to do the same for other forms of transportation. And if you account for the amount of exercise people are supposed to get to stay healthy there’s no additional calorie intake whatsoever.
I’ve got to ask, though—how is breathing CO2 pollution? Aren’t we just taking in air, removing the oxygen, and exhaling the waste gases? Isn’t there the same net CO2 afterwards?
Have I misunderstood something as simple as breathing? Please say no.
You haven’t misunderstood it! You’re just coupling cellular respiration with photosynthesis, which on the surface seems to balance to net zero – 6 CO2 molecules and sunlight create 1 glucose molecule, and we break down 1 glucose molecule for energy and generate 6 CO2 molecules.
There’s one big factor though which isn’t immediately obvious, and that’s the rate of reaction. The chemical equations say nothing about how many molecules are consumed per second. In order for the net CO2 to be zero, they’d need to consume and generate CO2, respectively, at the same rate, which isn’t the case.
It’s actually a really good thing, because photosynthesis happens faster. Plants are net negative CO2 because of that. What we’d need to complete this comparison now is how much CO2 a human generates by existing, and we can determine how many plants are needed per human to have the same net CO2.
Small aircraft have a carbon equivalent to large cars. My plane is from 1961 and has a fuel economy of 15mpg as the crow flies (arguably closer to 25mpg because of straight line measurements versus winding roads that can almost double the distance), seats 4 people comfortably, and flies at 160 mph.
Hmm, interesting. I had the opposite impression. Maybe from discussion of private jets? I wonder how commercial jets vs. private jets vs. light aircraft fare – similar to cars vs. buses, perhaps? I haven’t actually dug much into this subject :\
Props tend to be more efficient aircraft when it comes to fuel consumption but fly relatively low and slow. Jets are faster so they make more sense for ferrying people and cargo but they burn more fuel in the process.
how commercial jets vs. private jets vs. light aircraft fare
Just looked some up, they’re approximately, per passenger:
-, bus, ~100…300mpg/pp
Commercial jet, -, ~60…120mpg/pp
Ultralight, motorbike, train, ~50mpg/pp
Light aircraft, car, ~15…60mpg/pp
Private jet, limo, ~5…50mpg/pp
Fighter jet, monster truck, ~0.5mpg/pp
The more passengers, the more efficient.
So, fully loaded, there isn’t that much difference between a private jet, a limo, a car, light aircraft, ultralight, motorbike, train, or low range commercial jet.
But if it’s a single person, a private jet would use 10 times more fuel than a motorbike.
It was caught in FAA-Bureauctatic hell for 15+ years and just approved last year. It will be still be slow to become available and adopt for reasons that are complicated, but amount to bureaucracy, economics, and an insane degree of risk aversion. The vast majority of pilots want unleaded and it’s also much better for the engines.
That’s right, bike pollution is less than walking (or running) pollution in terms of CO2 per mile travelled. Cycling typically burns ~⅓ of the calories compared to making the same journey on foot and there’s a direct link between calories burnt and CO2 produced.
Cycling at 12mph takes roughly the same energy as walking at 4mph. You emit the same CO2 per minute, but get there in ⅓ of the time. Running at 12mph takes 3 times the effort of cycling at 12mph. You’ll get there in the same amount of time, but breath out 3 times as much CO2. Bicycles are more efficient than our own two legs - how cool is that!
bike pollution is slightly more than nil just because of the CO2 we breathe out while riding
Technically, the CO2 animals exhale is carbon neutral because it’s from plants you eat (or your food eats). Unless you’re eating petroleum derived products of course.
I say technically because while the plants themselves are carbon neutral, modern food production and distribution, especially meat production, still has a large carbon footprint. So your breath is only truly carbon neutral if you foraged for food in the forest on foot.
Compared to other countries, yes. And that’s not even comparing it to the US, which would be like kicking someone lying on the ground.
Try riding a train in rural France, outside the 5 TGV lines, for instance, and you’ll pray for Deutsche Bahn. Ever been to the UK?
But we could have much better PT if Germany weren’t the world’s greatest car exporter by far and the ministry of traffic deep in the pockets of automobile makers, that’s true as well.
So, as a not very smart man. Wouldn’t underground roads be better? I feel with it being underground it’d be easier to manage pollution and install some things to fight it.
Underground roads are crazy expensive. You need something to hold up the earth and anything else above it. There’s issues with water leaking in. Piping will have to go around it. If it breaks down somehow it will take longer to repair. It’s only really an option if the detour would be a lot longer or within urban areas for the extra space it frees up.
Or if you know, having greener spaces and roads underground are actually better for climate change. I’m not sure if this would help in that matter or not, but I think it’s a possibility. Not everything is about our made up concept of money.
What’s better for climate change is less cars on the road, not underground roads. If we are going to be digging these expensive tunnels in every city they should be for subway systems. That would be a substantially better use of the funds and would be a good step towards reducing the emissions of a city. This is all assuming that we stop subsidizing car ownership so heavily of course.
The entire process of building and repairing roads is pretty carbon intensive due to the amount of concrete involved.
I doubt it would affect pollution significantly. It’s not like both ends of the tunnel aren’t open to the air. It would definitely locally displace it so it’s not distributed across the above ground length of the road, but the same amount more or less (minus whatever adheres to walls) is still coming out of either end.
Underground tunnels also have the danger of fires rapidly spiraling out of control and in the past have killed dozens of people, and that was before electric cars became common. I would not want to be in a tunnel when a Tesla’s battery explodes.
I’m not saying this has no advantages, but for the trouble and cost it seems like a train would be better.
Nothing underground generates oxygen, but moving the roads from above to underground gives more “it’s free real estate” to grow grass and trees, like in the second photo, which generates oxygen and stores carbon. It’s not the best thing like suppressing the cars all together, but it’s better than the first picture.
Yeah, I completely forgot about the whole fire thing.
When yku say it like that. It makes more sense. It’s a shame we don’t have super efficient ways to convert exhaust gasses into healthier gasses. But yeah, if it’s just a short tunnel, the entrance and exits would just not funnel it right. I wonder if really long tunnels would be better. Maybe being able to use the entrances with a system to input clean air and force the exhaust through vents.
And I wonder if those fire suppression systems that starve the fires of oxygen could be something that could be useful? But that’d require automated doors to seal the tunnel, and then if someone is trapped on there, the fire is the last of their issue. Unless there were refugee points that also seal, but then you’ve gotta make sure everyone’s in them. I wonder if some form of scanner could be used to allow humans in. But then there’s that thing where a fire has been starved, but then gets a sudden burst of oxygen and it becomes explosive. I forgot what it’s called. I’m sure someone actually smart could brainstorm it better.
I feel it’s more likely they don’t understand proper usage of quotation marks like that. They probably think they give emphasis; I see it all the time.
Been in Colorado for the past week or so. You guys are a lot further ahead than Illinois is. Lots more bike paths and lanes, better traffic control that doesn’t result in stop and go movement, overall a lot more green space in your shopping centers and in human spaces, also lots more walking areas.
Don’t beat up your state too much, it’s fantastic compared to mine. :'c
I’m from So. IL originally and been to CO 4 times. Colorado is so much better in my opinion. People biking and jogging everywhere, everyone I met was really nice, like went out of their way to help my friends and I nice. Obviously that’s not everyone there, but it was the experience I had. Overall, it’s probably my favorite of the states I’ve been to and hope to go back, maybe permanently, someday.
I’d love to be a gatekeeper saying “we’re already full, turn back around”, but I’m a CA transplant myself. Personally, I’m looking to leave myself: too cold most of the year, and it’s getting really $$$. YMMV
It’s so backwards. Making this stretch of coastline walkable means more people show up, and if businesses realize this potential then they can capitalize. Makes sooo much sense
Fun fact this is actually the Rhine river that runs sort of ⅔ of the way through Düsseldorf, similar to the Thames in London or the Seine in Paris.
The other bank is much more residential and a little high end so it’s not really a gathering place for the population, whereas the bank shown in the picture is 2 blocks from a tram line that runs parallel to the river and runs into the heart of the CBD making it an extremely approachable body of water and pedestrian strip.
On the weekends, the city holds public events to draw people to gather on this bank like food fares, carnivals, concerts. It’s always packed on the weekends and generates a shit ton of foot traffic for all the pubs and restaurants in adjacent streets.
I had no idea all this was covered in highways just a few decades ago, making the city more walkable was an amazing choice. If you’ve never been to Düsseldorf before or don’t know anything about it, it is definitely one of the highlights of Germany once you’ve had your fill of all the war sites. Extremely liveable city without feeling overcrowded, and just a stones throw from the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and France.
I have no idea why you think it would be improved by slight adding of jpeg, but I agree, and I don’t know why. It feels like meme salt. Or maybe meme umami
It wasn’t until the age of eighteen, when he was given access to the clan’s ancient scrolls, that Kawakami finally realized the purpose behind his decades of training
Maybe on a purely east west dichotomy, but if we’re using the typical 4 regions of the u.s. : Northeast, south, Midwest and west, then that is not right.
It’s the name of the region. The Great Plains aren’t particularly great either, they’re just big. It’s like how the Mediterranean isn’t really in the middle of the world
“Great” in that sense doesn’t mean “good,” it means big. You see the same use in a lot of bird names as in the great blue heron or the great auk, just off the top of my head.
The US started as 13 colonies/states on the East coast. In the terminology, everything past that is “The West”, and this general area is the middle-ish part of that, so “Midwest”.
Not only is Wyoming solidly in the west, Wyoming arguably defines the west. Cowboys, sagebrush, the Rockies… If any part of Wyoming is “the midwest,” so is the moon.
The truth is that pretty much everything about the western US starts with California and then spreads back out. This is because, due to the gold rush, California was settled and made a state first, while the rest of the western states remained “territories” and only achieved statehood much later as they too became more heavily settled.
Basically, the settlement pattern of the western states is backwards after about 1852 or thereabouts, with the California and the west coast filling in first, and the interior states filling in later.
According to google the town of Midwest, WY has 283 people, which is damn near half of the state’s population. So add in a few more confused cowboys and that checks out.
Android. I tried a couple of browsers. When i look very closely now i see a tiny little rectangle that i can click on and it brings up the decade options
I think it’s really interesting too, but he was my grandfather, so I’m biased. I wasn’t really sure how interesting drawings of screw threads and gauges and calipers and such would be to other people.
mildlyinteresting
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