Cookies are easy to bake – a little flour, a little sugar, an egg, and maybe some chocolate chips. Bake in the oven for a bit and presto! Simple, right? If the cookie you are talking about is Eric Kayser’s Flourless Chocolate Cookie, then no, it is not simple nor is it basic. It is difficult, so you should go to his bakery and buy one. In Part Two of Effortless Girl’s Kayser profile, I will describe my attempt at his Flourless Chocolate Cookie. I tried to Repli-Kayser his cookie. It didn’t go so well.
Flourless Chocolate Cookies
I will begin by saying that Kayser’s Flourless Chocolate Cookie is the best cookie I’ve ever tasted. It is like half brownie/half cookie. It is rich and chewy with the perfect blend of sweetness and bitter chocolate. I wanted to make a replica of this delicious treat. However, my cookies weren’t the same…but compared to the Kayser cookie; well, nothing compares.
The cookie
Kayser’s cookie is the size of a large hockey puck. It is a perfect disk shape. I think it is amazing that this cookie rose at all given that there is no flour.
The thickness
The cookie is about an inch thick. It has chunks of chocolate in throughout the dough. It also tastes a little like the bottom was brushed with chocolate after it was baked. Yum. My recipe is a hybrid of several flourless recipes I browsed. There are many recipes out there, and I’m totally open to the possibility that mine could be much better. I used 2 1/2 – 3 cups powdered sugar, 3/4 – 1 cup of unsweetened cocoa powder, a pinch of salt, 2/3 cup of semi-sweet mini morsels, 1 egg, 2 egg whites, and a couple of tablespoons water. Begin by preheating the oven to 350 and line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
Ingredients
Measure chocolate and pour them onto a cutting surface. Chop the chips roughly. I chose to use mini morsels so they are already small, but I give them another rough chop.
Chop the chocolate
In a mixing bowl, combine sugar, salt, and cocoa powder. Give these a quick stir.
Mix dry ingredients
Break one egg and two egg whites into a dish. Give a fast whisk, but do not completely blend.
Break the eggs
Using a whisk, slowly mix the eggs into the dry ingredients. This can be a really messy process. You will be mixing until your hand hurts as the dough tightens up VERY quickly. Once the ingredients are basically combined, gently add the chocolate chips. At this point you will need to add a tablespoon or three of water at a time. The dough becomes almost impossible to stir and the water helps.
Mix all ingredients
The dough makes balls very easily. You can make large or small cookies. This dough is so stiff that the cookies won’t bake into each other in the pan. Also be sure and bake the cookies shortly after the dough is mixed as it keeps getting harder and harder. It is also extremely sticky. It just wasn’t my favorite thing to bake. Some people even refrigerate the dough before baking, but I cannot imagine this dough after it sets in the refrigerator. I vote no to that. Bake the cookies for 10 minutes and then turn the pan in the oven. Bake another 5 minutes and check them. They may need an additional 2 or 3 minutes after this depending on your oven.
The Result!
So the verdict? It isn’t a Kayser cookie. The taste was good but not Kayser good. I think the bar the Kayser cookie set is almost too high to reach. However, this version of the cookie bakes quickly and is a great treat especially if you are on a gluten free diet. The ingredient list was short and the kitchen cleaned up in a flash. These are definitely worth a try – if you have a recipe or an attempt at this type of cookie, let me know! Thanks to Eric Kayser and Maison Kayser for participating in this article set! If you are in NYC be sure to check out one of the Maison Kayser bakeries and decide which treat is your favorite!
