Ginger and Dark Chocolate Cookies

Well, these are one of my favourite cookie recipes, the combination of ginger and dark chocolate is just a pairing that’s meant to be.

I’ve been determined to convince my family and friends on this combination, as I know not everyone loves it as much as I do. But I have been known to easily finish a bag of the dark chocolate and ginger puddles from Hotel Chocolat – without sharing.

Why they taste so good:

This is a combination of sweet crystallised ginger and intense dark chocolate, basically it’s sweet and kinda spicy, but also a little bitter, and a little bit rich.
Unsurprisingly these were polished by my family within minutes… I’m pretty sure the time it takes to eat these is shorter than the time it takes to make them.

There’s ginger powder running through the biscuit itself, giving it a subtle gingery kick, but not enough to throw you off your feet, that’s where the crystallised ginger comes in. I’ve mixed equal amounts of white granulated sugar, and dark brown sugar – reason for this is that the molasses in the dark brown sugar complement the spices and add a caramel-like depth which works wonders.

Can I use light brown sugar?

Yes, you absolutely can, and texturally it will be fine but you will miss out on the additional flavour that the dark brown sugar provides.

My cookies spread too much/didn’t spread at all, what happened?

Ok, so this is down to one thing, the butter consistency. If your butter is over-softened or melted, these will spread out way too much and you will end up with a thin, crispy, and greasy cookie which is no fun.
On the other end of the spectrum, if your butter is too cold, you’ll struggle to cream the sugar into it, and likely end up with clumps of sugar or butter. When this happens, the cookies will barely spread out and will likely be underbaked.
The reason this happens is because in overly softened butter, the fat melts too quickly before the flour in the cookie has had time to ‘set’. Whilst in the opposite scenario, the flour ‘sets’ before the butter has melted, and so it can’t spread laterally, and hence spreads vertically.

To speed up your butter softening process, cut the butter into small cubes and leave at room temp for 20-30mins, you will know when it’s perfectly softened when you can press your finger into it and leave an indent, with the cube still holding shape.

Can I refrigerate/freeze the dough?

Yes, you can, but before baking you want to allow them to come back to room temperature. This is due to same reason aforementioned, cold butter = no spreading out = not a happy baker.
To freeze these, place each doughball on a lined tray or plate in a single layer, freeze until completely frozen and then transfer to a freezer-safe bag.
Just make sure to bring them to room temperature before baking.

Tips:

The only thing I URGE you not to compromise on is the quality of your chocolate, by all means feel free to substitute the dark chocolate for milk chocolate, but go and grab yourself your favourite bar. Make sure it’s one you really enjoy, and that will take your cookie up a notch.

Another handy thing to do is to roughly chop your chocolate bar to give you irregular shapes of chocolate running through your cookie dough.