Here’s another cookie without eggs as an ingredient. And you might be a bit confused because they get baked in muffin tins. Chef/author Dorie Greenspan claims, the purpose of which helps to caramelize the bottoms—thus the name. However, I think that’s stretching the truth a bit. The butter in the tin cups does make them easy to remove but doesn’t necessarily give them a noticeable caramelized bottom—but by no means takes away from the wonderful flavor of the cookie.
Once the dough has been refrigerated, it’s just a matter of cutting the logs into 1/2-inch slices, popping them into the muffin cups, and baking. Dorie says “You might be tempted to use a baking sheet, but I hope you won’t—the texture is really best in the muffin tins.” Seeing as how they disappeared quickly after baking them, I’d say they were a hit!
Caramel Chocolate Chunk Cookies
Ingredients
- 2 sticks unsalted butter, (8 oz.) cut into chunks, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar
- 1/2 tsp. fine sea salt
- 1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 heaping cup of chunks of dark chocolate, or large chips
Directions
- In a large bowl, beat the butter, both sugars, and the salt together on medium speed until creamy, about 2 minutes. Beat in the vanilla. Add the flour all at once. Pulse a few times, just until the risk of flying flour has passed, and then beat on low speed until the flour is almost completely incorporated. Don’t beat too much—you want the mixture to be more clumpy than smooth.
- Add the chocolate and fold in with a flexible spatula.
- Knead the dough if necessary so it comes together. Divide it in half, and shape each hunk into a 6-inch-long log; they will be a scant 2 inches in diameter. Wrap each log in plastic, and refrigerate until firm, at least 2 hours. (The logs can be refrigerated for 3 days or frozen for 2 months.)
- Preheat the oven to 350°. Butter a muffin tin—two if you have them. Mark one log at ½-inch intervals, then cut into rounds with a chef’s knife, cutting hard through the chips. Place each puck in a muffin cup. Bake for 20 to 22 minutes, until the cookies are browned around the edges and slightly soft in the center.
- Let the cookies rest for 3 minutes, then gently pry each one out with the tip of a table knife and let cool on a rack. Let the pan cool, then repeat with the remaining log. Serve the cookies warm or at room temperature.
Adapted from a recipe by Dorie Greenspan
Accounting for Taste 
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