Miso Brown-Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies (Eggless and Potentially Vegan)

Your quest for the perfect chocolate chip cookies ends here. Just sweet enough with deeply savory undertones from the miso and brown butter, these cookies have everything you could want from a chocolate chip cookie.

The Flavors

Miso

Miso, a deeply salty and umami Japanese fermented soybean paste, has recently catapulted itself into virality. It seems unusual to many — you put beans in these cookies? But it adds an amazing savory flavor to the cookies which accentuates the caramelized sugars and toasty flour.

That being said, it can be rather salty as well, so you’ll notice that this recipe has a much lower amount of salt than is typical.

Brown Butter

Brown butter, in my humbly overstated opinion, can improve almost any dessert out there. Chocolate chip cookies evoke warmness: sitting around the fireplace, cookies for Santa, and the like. Brown butter helps bring out these qualities in the final cookie.

American sweet-cream butter is 80% butterfat, 16-18% water, and 2-4% milk solids. By gently cooking the butter over medium heat, you drive out all the moisture and brown the milk solids left in the butter (mostly casein, whey proteins, and lactose). When these proteins and sugars are heated, they break down into amino acids and reducing sugars, which react with each other in a reaction known as the Maillard reaction. This produces the wonderfully toasty flavor of browned butter.

However, this recipe only uses 100 grams of butter. If that only contains 2-4 percent milk solids, that means there are only 2-4 grams of those coveted toasty bits. Adding just a bit of milk powder helps increase that number and create even browner butter.

A note on making this vegan: while I haven’t tested this myself, adding a tablespoon or so of ground pecans can add some of the toasty solids that vegan butter lacks.

On Eggs (and their substitutes)

I know far too many people who can’t (or won’t) eat eggs, so the total market for my cookies is woefully reduced.

There are dozens, if not hundreds, of egg substitutes out there. A lot of people swear by using mashed banana or applesauce in their baked goods to replace eggs. A lot of people, apparently, can’t taste copious amounts of fruit in their cookies.

Having tested (and unfortunately, tasted) many of these substitutes, I’ve found that ground flaxseeds and some water is the best substitute for cookies*. It’s not a foolproof workaround – a lot of recipes rely on the binding/setting power of eggs, and would turn out as goopy mushy blobs if you tried using this. This recipe, however, has been formulated to work with regular eggs or a flax egg. It relies a little more on flour (and some technique) to maintain its shape in its oven. I wouldn’t go out and buy flaxseed meal just for this. If eggs are all you have, then just use eggs.

To make the flax egg, mix 1 tablespoon of flaxseed meal with 3 tablespoons of water in a small bowl. Let it sit for about 10 minutes to let it gel.

*note: this substitute is not a one-size-fits-all situation. Few substitutes are. It works best in dense baked goods like brownies and cookies – I’d be wary of using it anywhere else.

Tips, Explanations, and Apologies

Measuring: Use a kitchen scale to measure your ingredients. Not only is it more precise (a cup of flour can vary from 120 – 160 grams if mismeasured, see King Arthur Baking), it also dirties far fewer dishes — you just dump everything into a bowl.

Butter: You can start browning your butter on medium heat, but reduce it to medium-low towards the end so you don’t burn it accidentally. Add the milk powder off the heat so it doesn’t burn. I’m sorry it only uses 7 tablespoons. I’m sure you can find a use for a tablespoon of butter.

Miso: Miso can be found in most large grocery stores nowadays. Look for white miso (brown); it’s not as sharply salty as red miso (darker brown). It might form little clumps when you whisk it into the melted butter. That’s okay. They’ll smooth out later as the butter cools.

Flour: This recipe uses only all-purpose flour. Do you want to hear my rant about Jacques Torres’ cookies? No? Here’s my rant about Jacques Torres’ cookies.

nvm, rant canceled. I was about to type out a rant about the pointlessness of mixing high- and low-protein flours. Torres explained in an interview that he does this because bread and cake flour are just what he keeps on hand; you could use all-purpose flour with no issue (The New York Times).

Written Recipe

Gather all ingredients ahead of time.

Add 7 tbsp. (100g) butter and 1 tsp. (5g) milk powder to a medium saucepan over medium-low heat. Allow the butter to melt and brown, swirling it and scraping the bottom to prevent it from burning. Take the butter off the heat once it stops spluttering and the milk solids are just turning golden brown. Any longer, and it’ll start burning.

Add 2 tbsp. (30g) miso paste and whisk to combine. Be careful; the butter may splash. Refrigerate the butter and miso mixture until cooled – it should be just firm on the edges.

While the butter is chilling, mix the dry ingredients. Add 1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour, 1/2 tsp. baking powder, 1/4 tsp. baking soda, and 1/4 tsp. kosher salt to a large mixing bowl. Whisk to combine.

Add the chilled butter-miso mixture into the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Add 1/2 cup (100g) granulated sugar and a drop of molasses (about 1/2 tsp, but I wouldn’t measure it). Beat on medium speed until the mixture is fluffy and noticeably lighter, about 2 minutes.

The mixture should look like this after it is properly beaten:

Add 1 egg (or flax egg, if using) and 1 tsp. vanilla extract. Beat on medium-high until pale and fluffy, about 4 minutes.

Add the flour mixture. Mix at low speed until it is barely combined (there should still be some streaks of flour).

Add 6 oz. (170g) dark chocolate chips.

Fold (or mix on low speed) until combined. Do not overwork the dough.

Cover the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 3 hours and up to 3 days. Longer is better – the flavor will intensify as the starches in the dough break down into simpler sugars that can caramelize in the oven, creating a toffee-like flavor.

While the dough chills, line 2 large aluminum sheet pans with parchment paper.

Preheat the oven to 350F (180C). After the dough has chilled, remove it from the refrigerator. Using a 1 oz. scoop, portion the cookie dough into balls, rolling them to smooth them.

Arrange the dough balls on the prepared baking sheets, with at least 2 inches of space between them. Break each dough ball in half, squishing them back together so the craggy tears face outwards (this helps create those beautiful craggy tops).

Set the broiler of your oven to 500F (260C). Carefully place the trays on the upper rack and allow to broil for 1-2 minutes, until you start to see a bit of color on the top.

Set the oven to bake again at 350F (180C). Bake the cookies for 10-12 min, or until they start to turn golden-brown around the edges.

Remove cookies for oven and allow to cool directly on tray for at least 20 minutes.

Using a glass the size of your cookies, gently swirl it around each cookie until they are circular. This is entirely optional and just for aesthetics; I often am too lazy to do this.

Using a wide metal spatula, lift the cookies off the pans and transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Enjoy your cookies! (optionally with a glass of milk)