Chocolate Chip & Cherry Cookies

Types of Chocolate

By Cat, 2009 (Photo, right, from Wikimedia Commons)

See also: 1. Cookies Menu; 2. Chocolate Choices for Baking (a sugar comparison)

What’s not to like about chocolate! and perhaps cookies are a wonderful way to get it because it comes in small doses – provided you don’t use too much sugar in the batter and don’t make the cookies as big as a plate.

I don’t like to use commercial chocolate chips because they contain a lot of fillers and questionable ingredients (such as GMOs). Most don’t use the high-cocoa-content chocolate that provides all the health benefits attributed to chocolate. Lastly, most commercial chocolate brands do not fairly compensate the farmers, so I look for “Fair Trade” chocolate (which usually is also Organic and thus avoids GMOs).

Instead of chocolate chips or bakers chocolate, I use Belgian dark chocolate that comes in a large bar that you can grate or chop into small pieces like chips, or melt like bakers chocolate.

This particular recipe appeals to me because: 1. it uses stevia instead of sugar; 2. it includes dried cherries, which are grown and dried locally where I live. However, I’ve not yet tested my adaptation of this recipe.

Chocolate Chip & Dried Cherry Cookies

This recipe is adapted from Lisa Jobs’ recipe in her book Sensational Stevia Desserts (1); her recipe is reproduced on the Defeat Diabetes Foundation website (2). Her original recipe uses white chocolate chips, which really isn’t chocolate at all, but just the cocoa butter – the fat in the chocolate. I want the health benefits and flavor of dark chocolate, so prefer to use Belgian high-cocoa-content dark chocolate instead of white chocolate.

However, white chocolate has more sugar than the high-cocoa content dark chocolate I use, so more sweetener is needed in the cookie batter. I choose to add Rapadura sugar for the added sweetener (because the equivalent amount of added stevia is too small to measure). For more detail on how I determine the amount of added sugar needed, see my article: Chocolate Choices for Baking (a sugar comparison).

Her recipe also uses all unbleached white flour, but I’ve adapted this to use part whole wheat flour – either whole wheat pastry flour (the best for cookies), or hard white whole wheat flour such as Wheat Montana’s Prairie Gold flour.

Lisa also cautions that because there is no real sugar in this recipe, it will not caramelize (brown) on the top. So check the bottom of the cookie for doneness, or insert a toothpick. Or replace part of the stevia with Rapadura flour. 1 tsp stevia extract powder is roughly equivalent to 1 cup white sugar. In this recipe, which calls for roughly 3/4 tsp stevia (equivalent to 3/4 cup sugar), you could use 1/2 tsp stevia and 1/4 cup sugar.

Ingredients & Equipment:

• 1/2 cup unsweetened dried cherries or unsweetened dried cranberries
• 1/2 cup 70% cocoa content dark chocolate chips (about 45 grams)
• 2 large eggs
• 3/4 tsp stevia extract powder (or more to taste)
• 1 Tbsp Rapadura sugar (added because substitute 70% cocoa content dark chocolate)
• 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, softened
• 1 1/4 cup unbleached white flour (divided)
• 3/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour, or hard white whole wheat flour
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp Unrefined sea salt
• Equipment:
• 2 cookie sheets
• baking parchment paper
• small bowl
• large bowl

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Place baking parchment on two cookie sheets.
2. Cut cherries into large bits and dredge with chocolate chips in 1/4 cup of the unbleached white flour
3. Sift remaining flour(s) with salt and baking powder into a bowl.
4. Beat eggs, stevia, added sugar, and vanilla extract with mixer in large bowl. Add butter and blend well (it will not ‘cream,’ but rather butter will separate from the eggs, to be re-incorporated when remaining ingredients are added)
5. Add half of the sifted flour mixture to egg mixture. Mix well, then add remaining flour mix and mix thoroughly. It will be thick.
6. Fold in dredged mixture.
7. Shape into 1 1/4″ balls, and press down with hand or bottom of a glass to 2″ diameter on prepared baking sheets.
8. Bake 10 – 12 minutes, or until bottom of cookie becomes slightly browned; watch carefully! Cool on racks.

Alternatives:

If use white chocolate chips, choose unsweetened chips, use 3/4 tsp stevia extract powder, and omit the 1 Tbsp sugar.

References:

1. The book: Sensational Stevia Desserts by Lisa Jobs (healthyshopping.com/books/Cart.asp?ItemNumber=0976524546)
2. Lisa Jobs does not have a recipe website, but her original recipe is available on the Defeat Diabetes Foundation Website: defeatdiabetes.org/wonderful-white-chocolate-chip-cherry-cookies