Wheat-Free Chocolate Chip Cookies

The book from whence these and those cookies came is property of the DC Public Library (and therefore you!). I should have disclosed in my previous post that I am—with the help of my amazing librarian friend Bobbie—quickly assuming acquaintance with a multitude of cookbooks (and young adult fiction), but this one from Alice Medrich is by far my most favorite. Had Bobbie not brought it to our charming yet slovenly home, I almost certainly never would have used it. And were it also not for Bobbie and DCPL, I would not have seen Twin Peaks, read Just Kids, heard that infernal Alban Berg opera that Joey has been playing, or figured out this whole graphic novel thing so easily. Bobbie and I met three years ago on Craigslist when I was just a DC naïf looking for a home, and since then it has been a totally edifying friendship involving lots of rad shit from water snakes, bicycles, and dancing to a shameless love of cultural pulp and romcoms (but also Pride and Prejudice! Which I guess is sort of a romcom too.).

I wouldn’t be here or nearly as happy without Bobbie, and these cookies wouldn’t be here or nearly as tasty without the DC Public Library. This is the first wheat-free cookie recipe using alternative flours that I have ever totally adored; they were also loved by my great pal Tory who is gluten-free, and they were deemed tolerably delightful by my dear housemate Susan who has professed a strong unhappiness with wheat-free goods. They are thin and crispy—fast becoming my favorite cookie qualities—and the crumb tastes sweet and buttery, not powdery and Play-Doh-esque, which I sometimes equate with gluten-free desserts. I think that you could love them, and so will the beautiful Bobbies your life. 

Wheat-Free Chocolate Chip Cookies

Adapted from Alice Medrich's Chewy, Gooey, Crispy, Crunchy

I used a scoop slightly smaller than that called for by Medrich and still came out with the 60 cookies predicted by this recipe. She adds one cup of coarsely chopped pecans as well, but I'm not so into that, so I upped the chocolate from 12 to 15 ounces. These are wheat-free, and will be considered gluten-free by your strictest eaters as long as you buy flours that have not come into contact with any wheat. Bob's Red Mill is always a reliable brand, and check your local co-op or farmers' market to see what's in stock.

1 cup + 3 tablespoons oat flour
1 cup brown rice flour, superfine if you have it
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons potato starch
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon aluminum-free baking soda
3/4 teaspoon xanthan gum
1/2 pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup dark brown sugar, packed
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
15 ounces hand-chopped chocolate chunks or large chips (semi-sweet will not overpower the delicate flours; use bittersweet if you want to get thwacked in the face with chocolate flavor)

1.  Combine the flours, potato starch, salt, baking soda and xanthan gum in a medium bowl and mix thoroughly with a whisk. In a large bowl, mix the melted butter, sugars and vanilla. Whisk in the eggs. Stir the flour mixture into the wet mixture. With a rubber spatula, mix the batter briskly for about 45 seconds to activate the xanthan gum, but don't overbeat or you risk gummy cookies (blech). Stir in the chocolate. If possible, let the dough stand for one to two hours at room temperature, or cover and refrigerate overnight.

2.  Preheat oven to 375 degrees F, and line your cookie sheets with parchment paper or foil dull side up. Using a 1 1/2-tablespoon cookie scoop (Medrich calls for 2 tablespoons), place mounds of cookie dough at least two inches apart on the sheets. Bake the cookies for 12 to 14 minutes until they are golden brown, rotating pans from front to back and top to bottom halfway through. Cookies will be soft when you remove pans from oven, so leave them on the sheet for about two minutes before moving them to wire racks to cool all the way. Ours kept well in a sealed container for the two days it took us to eat them all.