NYC Chocolate Chip Cookies!
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Giant, gooey and utterly delicious NYC chocolate chip cookies based on the famous cookies from New York City!!
NYC chocolate chip cookies
Can we take a minute, right at the beginning of this blog post, to appreciate… that I have given you guys this recipe. I have finally given you all the recipe that you have been after, for such a long long time. QUEUE THE APPLAUSE.
I’m joking – seriously. But anyway… I will say the reason they took this long to come to my blog, is because I only, finally, went to New York four months ago, so I finally got to try some classic NYC cookies for myself!
I wasn’t prepared or willing to post an NYC chocolate chip cookies recipe before I had actually eaten some for myself! I feel like that is pushing the limit really… can you make a recipe for something as famous as this, if you haven’t even there and eaten them?!
Levain Bakery
Anyway. When I was in New York, I ate so. many. cookies. The best of all, for me personally, was the ones from Levain Bakery. Oh, holy geeeeeeee they were insanely epic. I heard lots and lots of talk about Levain Bakery on my social channels before I went, and my gosh they did not disappoint.
I managed to get in when there was absolutely no queue, and then trotted over to Central Park to enjoy them, and my gosh it was the best thing ever. Not only was I finally taking in the sites of Central Park, in actual New York City, but the cookies… wow.
When it comes to making a recipe for them though, I will say that these are not authentic Levain Bakery cookies, as I just don’t think they can be recreated. I really don’t. There are many great NYC chocolate chip cookies recipes out there – this recipe from Modern Honey is great, so is this one from Cupcake Jemma, or this one from Kirbie Cravings!
Recipe
I have honestly made about 20 batches of cookies now, to get these right. There are so many factors when it comes to making these cookies – and jeez it’s hard to get them all right. When researching into recipes, what Levain Bakery and other bakeries such as Creme in London and so on do.. it is a bit of a mix. What flavours actually go into them, what order you put the ingredients in, and so on! Lots of recipes use a mix of two flours, but I like to stick to just one!
I basically just wanted to create giant chocolate chip cookies, that resemble NYC chocolate chip cookies, that are easier to make. They are definitely different from the rest of my cookies, but that’s what we want – NYC cookies are a world of their own. I teased this post on my Instagram a little while ago and you guys went crazy for them… so I hope you are READY!!
This recipe is quite easy to follow, luckily. I wanted to make it as simple as possible – but obviously any questions, leave them below.
The cookie dough
The cookie dough for this recipe is quite similar to the other NYC Cookie recipes I’ve shared on my blog – the basic cookie dough, as you will see can be used in so many variations, but they work for me – so why change it?
- Butter – I use fridge-cold baking spread or room-temperature block butter, but either works well.
- Sugar – A blend of granulated sugar and light brown soft sugar enhances the flavour and gives the cookies a rich taste.
- Egg – I usually bake with medium eggs, but you can substitute with one large egg if that’s what you have on hand.
- Flavours – Vanilla extract is optional but add a wonderful depth of flavour.
- Flour – Always use plain flour for your cookies! Self-raising flour will result in a cake like texture, which you want to avoid.
- Raising Agents – I use both bicarbonate of soda and baking powder. Bicarb is the traditional choice for cookies, while baking powder helps achieve the signature texture of a New York-style cookie.
- Salt – I add sea salt to my cookie dough because it enhances the flavours, but you can skip it or use salted butter if you prefer.
Sugar
I use a mix of two sugars… light brown sugar (soft), and white granulated sugar. This is similar to my other recipes, such as my Mini Egg cookie bars – in the fact that it gives the best flavour and texture. You really want to stick to these if you can – but you can use all brown, or all white if you have to.
Switch the sugars to caster sugar can really change the texture. I’m not the biggest fan of caster sugar in cookies anymore – and if you try this recipe as listed, you will agree with me. There is alot of science behind sugars in cookies – and if you can grab the listed sugars I will promise you, they will be better.
Flour
Now when it comes to the flour… I stand by using cornflour in my other recipes. I really honestly do. I even think these are better with a bit of cornflour. The cornflour creates a softer texture in the cookie, without drying the cookie out. It’s perfection. However, a lot of you don’t like using it.
A lot of NYC Cookie recipes use a mix of flours, but again I wasn’t a fan… I wanted to make it be fewer ingredients. However, you can switch it up. You can easily use self-raising flour instead of plain, but you would then only use the bicarbonate of soda, and no baking powder
I use all plain flour and add in the baking powder to get the texture, and I love it. You want the rise from the raising agents to create the perfect texture.. and it really works! You want a decent amount of flour, and to help it raise to get the classic texture so that when you bite into it… heaven.
Chocolate?!
When it comes to the chocolate chips, I, as always, use actual chocolate chips. I use a 50/50 mix of milk chocolate and dark chocolate. You get the sweetness from the milk chocolate, but also some bitterness from the dark chocolate which creates the balance. You can, of course, use all of one or the other.
I like to use baking chocolate chunks as they are slightly larger, but you can use bars of chocolate that you can chop up, or you can use any supermarket chocolate chip. Honestly, any work. You can use a mix of other flavours of chocolate as well, or even adapt to include extras. I just wanted a base recipe on this particular recipe post.
Tips & Tricks
- These are best eaten on the day of baking, but can be revived by microwaving for 15-30 seconds, or putting into a hot oven for 2-3 minutes
- You can freeze the raw cookie dough easily, and bake from frozen if you don’t want to bake the entire batch
- If you are baking straight from frozen after some time, I usually bake for the same 12-14 minutes, at the same temp, but an extra couple minutes won’t hurt
- Once baked, these will last for 4-5+ days
- You can use any chocolate you fancy, I just love the combination of milk and dark chocolate
- You can use chocolate bars chopped up instead of chocolate chips, just make sure the chunks aren’t too big
- If your oven runs hot you will want to reduce the temp slightly as mentioned in the method
- If you prefer your cookies flatter, you can squish them down slightly before baking but I don’t do this personally
- If you want a lovely texture – you can add in 1 level tbsp of cornflour, and take out 25g of the flour
- If you can’t access one of the sugars, use all of the other one – i.e. all granulated, or all light brown sugar. Using other sugars can change the texture.
- If you want to make smaller cookies (60g) – they take about 9 minutes to bake
NYC Chocolate Chip Cookies!
Ingredients
- 125 g unsalted butter
- 100 g light brown sugar
- 75 g white granulated sugar
- 1 medium egg
- 1 tsp vanilla (optional!)
- 300 g plain flour
- 1 + 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 1/2 tsp sea salt
- 300 g chocolate chips (150g dark, 150g milk)
Instructions
- Add your butter and sugars to a bowl and beat until creamy - I use my stand mixer with the beater attachment
- Add in your egg, and beat again. If using vanilla, add it in now
- Add in the plain flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, and salt and beat until a cookie dough is formed
- Add in your chocolate chips and beat till they're distributed well
- Weigh your cookies out into eight cookie dough balls - they're about 120g each
- Once they're rolled into balls, put your cookie dough in the freezer for at least 30 minutes, or in the fridge for an hour or so
- Whilst the cookie dough is chilling, preheat your oven to 180C Fan, or 200C regular! If your oven runs hot, go for 160C-170c.
- Take your cookies out of the freezer/fridge and put onto a lined baking tray. I put four cookies per tray
- Bake the cookies in the oven for 12-14 minutes. I don't personally flatten the cookies, as they flatten enough during baking - however, if you like flat cookies, flatten them a bit before baking.
- Once baked, leave them to cool on the tray for at least 30 minutes, as they will continue to bake whilst cooling
- ENJOY!
Notes
- These are best eaten on the day of baking, but can be revived by microwaving for 15-30 seconds, or putting into a hot oven for 2-3 minutes!
- You can freeze the raw cookie dough easily, and bake from frozen if you don't want to bake the entire batch!
- If you are baking straight from frozen after some time, I usually bake for the same 12-14 minutes, at the same temp, but an extra couple minutes won't hurt!
- Once baked, these will last for 4-5+ days!
- You can use any chocolate you fancy, I just love the combination of milk and dark chocolate!
- You can use chocolate bars chopped up instead of chocolate chips, just make sure the chunks aren't too big!
- If your oven runs hot you will want to reduce the temp slightly as mentioned in the method!
- If you prefer your cookies flatter, you can squish them down slightly before baking but I don't do this personally!
- If you want a lovely texture - you can add in 1 level tbsp of cornflour, and take out 25g of the flour!
- If you can't access one of the sugars, use all of the other one - i.e. all granulated, or all light brown sugar. Using other sugars can change the texture.
- If you want to make smaller cookies (60g) - they take about 9 minutes to bake!
ENJOY!
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J x
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Ah thank you! I have used your cookie bar recipes a lot and didn’t think to do it this way. So I am guessing I can use one of them and just roll it out to a big cookie shape on a tray? Thanks
I would bake the cookie bar like normal, but into a circular tin so it holds a nice round shape rather than a square tin!
My plan was to bake it on a large round tray for size. However do you think this would spread out to much when baking if not in a round tin with edges? Ps sorry for all the questions! Appreciate the help.
Yes, it would just spread and might not work nearly as well as if it was contained.
Have you left your cookie dough in the fridge/freezer for longer (like a day or two like some cookie recipes suggest) if so do you think it would make a difference if i left them to bake a day or two later?
You definitely can – I generally freeze them if I’m leaving them longer than a day, but the fridge works just as well! After two days I would suggest freezing though! X
Hi Jane, my!! You has me at the photos!! I m definitely gonna try it. One question: you said to use granulated sugar (instead of caster sugar), ar eyou referring to those big rough sugar sold for general cooking? The crystals are definitely many times the size of caster sugar. Won’t they have problem melting/dissolving into the butter? Thanks in advance for your kind reply 😀!
Hiya! So granulated sugar has the same size granules as the light brown sugar which is also used in the recipe – it’s the kind of sugar that you would put into tea or coffee! It doesn’t have a problem dissolving, and I much prefer it to caster sugar as I’ve explained in the post! x
Tried these today and they are AMAZING!! Put them in the fridge for an hour and they worked perfectly. Thanks!
So glad you liked them!!
Omg these look amazing! Is there any way you can use self raising flour? 😩 so hard to get flour at the moment x
Yes, you can!! I mention this in the post – you need to leave out the baking powder, and only use 1/4tsp bicarb!
i have made these from cupcake jemma and they are very much the same recipe and method. Thank you for the recipe, gonna try these
I love Cupcake Jemma, but this recipe is different, and the method is also different, but I hope you enjoy them anyway!
Amazing cookies Thankyou for the recipe
Ahh thank you!!
Looks amazing.. I can’t wait to try these during the week when my step son comes home.. so glad I found your page (but I’m trying to lose weight and everything looks unreal)
When I get enough flour I’m so going to try these….. They look AMAZING 🤤😍
Ahhh thank you so much!!
Looks amazing can’t wait to try. Quick question, what is 11/2 tsp baking powder. Do you mean 1/2?
No, it’s 1 and a 1/2. so 1.5.
Mmmmm these look incredible! Can’t wait to make these! Just a quick question – do I need to preheat the oven for the whole duration the cookie dough is chilling?
Thanks for sharing ❤️
Also I forgot to ask, can these be made as triple chocolate cookies? P
They can, but I do have that recipe coming soon which is altered a bit more.
You just need it to be preheated before you bake… so the best time is during the chilling.
Hi Jane, I can’t wait to try these! Annoyingly the only thing I am missing is bicarbonate of soda, but I do have baking powder, SR flour, plain flour and cornflour. Is there a combo that I can do to alleviate needing the bicarb? Thanks 😀
So ideally you would use the bicarb for the perfect cookie – it’s used in so many cookie recipes as it helps create the perfect cookie! However, you can use 1/2tsp more baking powder with the recipe as it is, but the texture might be slightly different! X
Hey! If I were to use cornflour as you suggest in the body of this blogpost, would it be a straight swap out with the plain flour? These look delicious! Was going to make triple chocolate cookies this weekend but they may have to wait now I’ve seen these….
Have a look at the notes for the cornflour bit!
Hi Jane. I’m definitely gonna try these today! Love the idea of freezing them to have a stash for later. Just wondering how long do you think it would take to bake them from frozen?
The same amount of time roughly or 1-2 minute extra! I haven’t seen a difference when I’ve baked directly from frozen (when they’ve been frozen for a while)
Hi Jane, this recipe looks amazing! Do you think I could make this into one giant cookie? I have been set a task to do this for a friend but I am just not confident on how to do it and if it would cook in the oven fully being one cookie?! Any help would be appreciated!
You definitely can – but I have lots of cookie bar recipes that would probably be better – and the temperature and timings are different on those to make sure the cookie is still soft and not over baked!
Love love love this recipe! I love all of your recipes and your website is my go to whenever I’m going to bake anything. I’ve made these cookies twice and both times they’ve come out amazing and everyone loves them. I made mine a little smaller but they still came out great. The only downside is I can’t stop eating them myself… 🤭
Hahaha yes, cookies are so moreish!!!
So excited for these! I’m 100% trying them out today
Ahh yay!! I hope you love them!