Crispy Chocolate Chunk Cookies

These cookies were inspired by the cereal bars that have called my name every lunchtime for the last couple of weeks. They weren’t just any cereal bars, but the type that cuts through the health claims of cereal bars in general with a thick chocolate or yogurt coating that makes all the difference to my eating pleasure – the type that is really a chocolate bar with ‘cereal’ in the title and a handful of nuts and dried fruit thrown in to appease guilty health consciences. These cookies certainly do not tick the ‘healthy’ box but I’d like to hope that they do tick a ‘happy’ box. I was certainly happy when they turned out very close in reality to the way I’d imagined them when the idea was conceived. This makes about 14 cookies (or more, depending on how much raw batter, which I actually prefer to the baked version, you eat). All the cup measurements below are based on a 250 ml mug as equal to one cup.

What you’ll need:

1/2 cup butter

1 cup light brown sugar

2 eggs

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla essence

1 1/2 cups self-raising flour

Pinch salt

1 cup crisped rice

100 grams milk chocolate

What to do:

1. Pre-heat the oven to gas mark 4 (180ºC or 350ºF).

2. Cream together the butter and sugar.

3. Add the eggs and vanilla essence to the butter and sugar and beat together well with an electric beater.

4. Sift the flour and salt into the bowl and fold into the butter/sugar/egg mixture (please imagine a photo with all of the flour incorporated into the mixture – I appear to have forgotten to take one…).

5. Roughly chop the chocolate.

6. Add the chopped chocolate and crisped rice to the bowl and fold into the flour/butter/sugar/egg mixture until the chocolate and crisped rice are well-distributed throughout the mixture.

7. Place dessertspoonfuls of the mixture on a greased tray, at least 1 inch apart and flatten (or rather smush down) with the back of a fork.

8. Bake the cookies in the middle of the pre-heated oven for about 20 minutes or until they are a golden brown colour.

9. Remove the cookies from the oven and either cool on a cooling rack or (my preferred option) eat straight away whilst warm and filled with pockets of melty chocolate.