A couple of months ago, Elizabeth from www.glutenfreebaking.com, announced that she was hosting a gluten free recipe contest. I decided to enter several recipes, but the first one I entered was for my original chocolate chip cookies.
I had actually forgotten about the contest and there were SO many entries (hundreds, apparently!) that I thought I really didn't have much of a chance to win.
But earlier this week, I received this email from Elizabeth:
Grand Prize Winner?? WOW!!
Well, needless to say Elizabeth made my day!
My cookies are now famous! Wohooo!!! Aren't there any retailers out there who'd like to market these gluten free babies?? :-)
Make sure to check out Elizabeth's great gluten free site! For the grand prize, I get six month's free membership on her wonderful website, and I get a free copy of her cookbook, Easy Gluten Free Baking. I can't wait to make a few of these recipes and I'll share them with you if it's okay with Elizabeth!
Thanks so much Elizabeth!!
For those of you who haven't made these sinfully delicious chocolate chip cookies, here's the recipe:
The BEST Chocolate Chip Cookies
(Before or After going Gluten-Free!)
- *1/2 cup butter-flavored Crisco (NO SUBSTITUTES!!! -- see note below)
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar
- 3/4 cup brown sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup tapioca flour
- 1/2 cup sorghum flour
- 1/4 cup brown rice flour
- 1/2 tsp. kosher salt
- 1/4 tsp. xanthan gum (**optional - Elizabeth found this ingredient unnecessary!)
- 1 tsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. baking soda
- 6 oz. GF chocolate chips
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl: cream butter with sugars until light and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla. In a separate bowl mix together flours, salt, xanthan gum (opt.), baking powder, and baking soda. Slowly add flour mixture to butter and sugar mixture. Last, mix in chocolate chips. Place golf-ball sized dough portions 2 inches apart on an UNGREASED cookie sheet. Bake 7-9 minutes or JUST UNTIL edges are light brown.
(The cookies WILL NOT look completely cooked when you pull them out of the oven! That's what you want! That's part of the secret to these awesome cookies! DO NOT overbake them!)
Let cookies cool on a wire baking rack or the cookie sheet for 5-10 minutes. This will allow cookies to retain their shape for eating!
This recipe doubles easily.
*Note: Normally, I do NOT like using shortening for baking because it is a trans-fat, and therefore really not good for you. BUT since we only make these cookies occasionally, and since shortening really seems to make a better gluten-free cookie than butter (for reasons why visit Sea's cookie review), we stick to using a butter flavored shortening.
Also, xanthan gum is completely optional in this recipe, but I think adding just a tiny bit makes for a chewier gluten-free cookie!
UPDATE: These cookies WILL RUN if you choose to use all butter, or margarine, and leave out the shortening completely! If you choose NOT to use shortening, make sure to refrigerate your dough for several hours before baking, this will help to alleviate the cookies spreading too much. Also, the size of the dough placed on the cookie sheet needs to be about 2 tablespoons worth of dough, not necessarily the size of a golf ball, as stated originally in the recipe! Make them as large or small as you desire -- you will have to cook them longer if they are larger!! It also helps to bake these cookies on a silpat mat or parchment paper to prevent spreading.
(For a printer-friendly version of this recipe, click here)
