Brown Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookie Bar Hearts
Hi friends! Happy almost Valentine’s Day! Do you have any plans or are you of the belief that it’s just a commercial holiday and basically a waste of time? I’m an old romantic at heart, so Boyfriend & I always find some small way to celebrate each other. This year, what with the lockdown still in place, we’ll probably take it really easy. Maybe a stroll on the seafront, our favourite dinner with a nice bottle of wine, and maybe a good rom-com. Oh! And these bad boys: Brown Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookie Bar Hearts. Cookie bars, half of which are cut into heart shapes because I was feeling cute.
But really, how adorable are these?
why cookie bar hearts?
These cookie bars have been a super long time in the making. If I remember correctly, I pulled my first rendition of these out of the oven back in May 2014. I’d just finished college, I was about to set off to walk the Camino de Santiago with my best friend, and I baked these to bring as an in-flight snack. Let me tell you: we devoured them. During the long and tiring days that followed, walking from tiny Spanish town to tiny Spanish town, we reminisced about how good they were. We daydreamed about them all across Spain, and by the time we got home a few months later, I was itching to make them again. There was only one problem: I couldn’t find my recipe notes anywhere. I tried and tried, but they were never as good as the original.
At this stage, I’d almost given up hope – until recently. Going through some backups of old drafts from my Tumblr days, I found my notes! They were hiding under a recipe for French opera cake, and I’m so happy about it! I’ve pared the recipe back somewhat, but I’m confident these are just as good as the original. And they’re so much more adorable because half of them are heart shaped for Valentine’s Day!
what ingredients do I need?
Here’s what we’ll need:
• dries: flour, bicarb, baking powder, and milk powder. I like adding milk powder to my bakes because it adds depth of flavour and extra chewiness, but you do you.
• sugars: a mixture of light brown and caster. Light brown for a caramel flavour and chewy interior, and white for a crispy top.
• fats: butter, because it makes the world go ’round, and eggs.
• extras: vanilla extract, and some big ole’ chunks of both dark and milk chocolate. If you’re partial to a pecan cookie bar, I can confirm that adding an additional cup of chopped pecans works very well.
how to make brown butter chocolate chunk cookie bar hearts
Okay, let’s bake.
Ingredient mise en place is always a good idea when baking.
These cookie bar hearts begin with browning some butter. I know you know how to brown butter, but just in case: Joy can help.
All the dry ingredients get mixed together in one bowl, and the sugars get beaten together with the eggs and vanilla extract in another. If you’re feeling particularly lazy, you can weigh all the dry ingredients directly into the beaten egg mixture so you don’t have to wash an extra bowl. I promise not to tell anyone, and as long as you combine thoroughly it won’t really matter.
Once everything is combined, we can add our chocolate chunks.
Into the oven for 20-ish minutes and there we have it!
I like to leave the cookie bars to cool in the tin for about 20-minutes, and then I yank them out and get slicing/stamping with my cookie cutter. Heart shapes are optional of course, but it does make everything feel a little bit more special.
I hope you love them, friends!
Happy Saturday! xo
Brown Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookie Bar Hearts
INGREDIENTS
- 113 g salted butter, cubed
- 270 g plain flour
- 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp milk powder
- 200 g light brown sugar
- 100 g caster sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 250 g dark chocolate, chopped into chunks
- 85 g milk chocolate, chopped into chunks
- flaky salt, for sprinkling
DIRECTIONS
- Preheat oven to 180°C. Grease & line a 9×13-inch baking tray with parchment paper; set aside.
- In a small saucepan, melt the butter over a medium-low heat until browned. For more info: Joy the Baker on How to Brown Butter. Pour the brown butter into a bowl – brown bits at the bottom and all! – and leave to cool for 5-minutes.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, and milk powder; set aside.
- In a large bowl with an electric whisk, beat together the brown butter and sugars until combined. Add the eggs & vanilla extract, and beat until smooth. Slowly add the dry ingredients and mix on low justtt until combined. Using a spatula, stir in the chocolate chunks.
- Transfer the cookie dough into the prepared tray, using an offset spatula to smooth over the top. Bake in the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes, or until the top of the bars are light golden brown, and the edges have puffed and started to pull away from the pan. Allow to cool in the pan for 15-minutes before using a heart shaped cookie cutter to stamp out hearts.
Did you make this recipe? I’d love to know! Please leave a comment & a rating below, or tag me on Instagram @imvcki. Thank you so much for supporting Passionate Baker!
Super moist and delicious! The browned butter and flaked salt really raises this recipe above the usual cookie mix <3