Battle of the Chocolate Chip Cookies - Thin and Crispy (Part 2 of 7)

Left - Diva's Can Cook, Right - Chef John

If you love thin and crispy chocolate chip cookie recipes then oh boy do I have a couple recipes for you to try! I compare the cookies based on cookie dough edibility, and taste & texture after baking, at room temperature, and after a day. This recipe experiment is dedicated to my best friend Kasha ❤ , because she's the only person I know that prefers thin and crispy chocolate chip cookies.

My review of each recipe is below.

Here are the recipes, my review of the recipes, and pictures of the process of making each cookie recipe. Below I refer to the recipe shown in the top photos as Chef John's Recipe and the recipe shown in the bottom as Divas can Cook recipe.

If you want to see the other chocolate chip cookie "battles":

Part 1 (Soft and Melty)

Part 2 (Thin and Crispy)

Part 3 (Thick and Cakey)

Part 4 (Chewy)

Part 5 (Top Rated Recipes)

Part 6 (Joshua Weissman vs. Chris Morocco)

Part 7 (Browned Butter)

Chef John's Recipe:

Ingredients:

• 1 cup and 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, very soft

• 1/2 cup white sugar

• 1/4 cup light brown sugar, packed

• 1/2 large egg

• 1 tablespoon milk

• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Whisk flour, salt, and baking soda together in a bowl. In a separate bowl, cream the butter, white sugar, and brown sugar together until mixture is light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes on medium speed. Add the egg, milk, and vanilla extract and mix on low speed incorporated.

2. Pour dry ingredients into the wet ingredients; stir until flour just mixed in (do not overmix!). Stir in the chocolate chips.

3. Preheat oven to 375°F. Line baking sheet with parchment paper.

4. Scoop out/roll tablespoon (~1 inch wide) sized balls of dough and place on prepared baking sheet, leaving 3 inches of space between cookies (about 8 per sheet). Use your fingers/palm to squish each cookie to 1/4 inch thick (as thick as the chocolate chips). If you choose not to flatten them they will be thicker and cakier (especially if you chill the dough). Bake until golden brown, about 10-12 minutes. Cool cookies on tabletop or rack.

5. They'll get crispier as they cool.

6. Store in an airtight container at room temperature up to 5 days.

7. Makes ~20 cookies.

Divas can Cook recipe:

Ingredients:

• ¼ cup butter-flavored shortening

• ¼ cup unsalted butter, room temperature

• ⅓ cup light brown sugar, packed

• ⅓ cup granulated white sugar

• 1 egg, room temperature

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 1 cup flour

• ½ teaspoon baking soda

• 1/4 teaspoon salt

• ¾ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375°F.

2. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Set aside.

3. In a large bowl cream together shortening, butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar for about 90 seconds on medium speed.

4. Mix in egg and vanilla extract until combined.

5. Mix in flour, baking soda, and salt until just combined (do not overmix!)

6. Fold in chocolate chips.

7. Scoop out tablespoonfuls (~1 inch wide) of dough and about 2 inches apart on prepared baking sheet.

8. Completely flatten each ball of dough (to 1/4 inch thick).

9. Bake for 7-8 minutes or until golden all over.

10. Remove from oven and let cookies sit in the pan for about 2-3 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack to finish cooling. Cookies will crisp up even more as they cool.

11. Store in airtight container up to 5 days.

12. Makes ~24 cookies.

My Review:

Cookie dough edibility: The Divas can Cook recipe wins this area. It was softer and sweeter than Chef John's recipe.

Taste & texture after baking: Pretty much the same, hard to distinguish. They were both lightly crispy on the outer edges and soft and melty in the middle.

Taste & texture at room temperature: Unlike the soft and melty cookies I made a week ago, both cookies "crack" apart when you break them in half and are much more crumbly and crunchy. Both cookies are still crisp, with Chef John's recipe being crisp throughout and Divas can cook recipe being slightly chewy in the center. Both recipes were satisfactorily sweet and buttery, but not greasy. In terms of taste, I enjoy the Divas can Cook recipe better, I think the ingredients are well proportioned and the shortening adds an extra touch, giving it a little more dimension than the Chef John recipe. However, the shortening also adds a tiny touch of a synthetic taste, but this disappeared by the time I ate them the next day. Also, the Chef John recipe tastes slightly over baked, which may be my fault when baking them or it could be because the original recipe called for chilling the dough to make it taste more "toffee-like," hence why it has a slightly overcooked caramel flavor. The taste of the Chef John cookie is very well balanced.

Taste & texture after a day: Day old cookies for both recipes were still quite crisp, with Chef John's still crisp throughout and Divas can Cook recipe being a little chewy in the middle still (likely due to more brown sugar in her recipe). The Chef John cookies still have that overcooked taste that I'm not a fan of and also taste more stale than the Diva's can cook recipe. Overall the flavor is still well balanced in the Chef John recipe. On the contrary, the Divas can Cook cookies taste more sweet when they are a day old and the flavor of the shortening disappeared. Overall the Divas can Cook recipe tasted better the next day.

Overall Judgement: Both are great recipes, but I prefer the Divas can Cook recipe. What is cool though, and I'll make a separate blog post about this, is that I learned that you can make both thick and cakey and thin and crispy versions of Chef John's cookies by only varying the shaping and size of the cookies before baking, so that's cool. Don't be afraid to try both recipes because they are definitely thin and crispy!

Pictures of making them (Chef John Recipe on top for each set and Divas can Cook recipe on bottom):

Before creaming the butters and sugars.

After creaming the butters and sugars.

After mixing in the eggs and vanilla (and milk in the Chef John recipe). YOu can start to see a big difference in texture.

After mixing in the dry ingredients.

After mixing in the chocolate chips. The Divas can Cook dough was a lot stickier but tasted better than Chef John's recipe's cookie dough.

This picture is just Chef john's recipe for cookie dough, which I wrapped and chilled for two hours (which was part of his original recipe). However, this step isn't necessary. I think if I had skipped refrigeration they would have gotten a little flatter and crispier!

Cookie doughs layed out (and about to be flattened!)

Cookies after flattening!

Nice and flat.

An individual cookie before baking.

Both cookie recipes while baking. I was scared watching them because they looked like they would turn thick and fluffy, but they didn't!!!

Cookies after baking, they look pretty darn similar, the Divas can Cook cookies (bottom) did spread a little more though, probably because the dough wasn't refrigerated.

Individual cookie comparison.

Unlike the soft and melty cookies I made a week ago, these ones "crack" apart and are much more crumbly and crunchy.

Beautiful! Chef John's recipe is on the right and Divas can Cook recipe is on the left.