29 Comments
Sep 17Liked by Nicola Lamb

What do you think about swapping tahini for the peanut butter? Despite being an American, I’m just not a fan of peanut butter cookies but I’ve had some awesome tahini chocolate chip ones before!

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Sep 17Liked by Nicola Lamb

As a Minnesotan living in Sweden for the past few years I am so so thrilled you featured the Twin Cities and especially the MN State Fair! It's such a unique experience and one I miss very much

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Sep 17Liked by Nicola Lamb

This is a little off topic but you mentioned that baking soda increased the Maillard reaction. For cookies using browned butter which have already undergone one Maillard reaction, would this be an instance where it would be worth using 1/2 baking soda and 1/2 baking powder to prevent the cookie from getting too brown?

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Thank you for your service to cookies 🫡🫡🫡 and also...I *desperately* want to go to Minnesota State Fair one day now!

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You did the Midwest proud! I live in Chicago, and was born and raised in Ohio - where we have the excellent chocolate and peanut butter Buckeyes as our state candy. There's a wonderful world of highly regional foods all over the US, as I'm sure there is everywhere in the world. I'm hoping to make my first trip overseas to do some food tourism in the Mediterranean next fall.

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Pickle pizza next week, pls 😁😁

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Dear Nicola, as a cookie fanatic, this deep dive into all things cookies is the best I’ve read. Thank you for featuring the PB CCC and the MN State Fair! 💕

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sounds fun and yummy

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These are delicious Nicola, made them today! Need to visit Minnesota...

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This is amazing. I live north of Minnesota in Manitoba. Can’t wait for the bundts, that’s my speciality.

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wow! what an incredible post and deep dive into cookies, love the experimentation!!

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Hello! Love this so much thank you always. What brand of chocolate did you use? Sometimes the milk chocolate that I use doesn’t melt in the oven and create those beautiful puddles

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I’m looking at this again and not seeing the point at which the salt is added. I think using my common sense it would go with the flour and baking soda (and did that the first time) but this second time I completely spaced on it and now can’t find it’s location beyond ‘extra salt’ 🫣

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If you come to the fair again next year, I'd love to try to meet up if possible! I'm in Minneapolis. It is a whirlwind time of year so if itineraries don't allow, I understand! I do have a cookie development question: I would like to adapt a chewy sugar cookie recipe into a thumbprint cookie. Could I start by simply removing the leavening agents? This may be too involved/off topic. I am going to check out that How Baking Works book you mentioned! Thanks for such a great newsletter!

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Hello! I just discovered your incredible newsletter and, as an aspiring recipe developer (someday!), I truly appreciate your diligent work. Thank you!

I still feel confused about one thing:

"For a spreadier, chewier cookie, go for bicarb; For the chewiest flattest cookie, 2% bicarb is better [than 1%]..."

I must have missed some critical scientific premise, but after several reads I can't figure it out. I fully understand why baking soda leads to a spreadier cookie when compared to baking POWDER, but why would less baking soda (1%) produce a taller cookie than more of ITSELF (2%)...?

...Perhaps more importantly, besides culinary school, may I ask which resources (books or otherwise) you would recommend to really learn the science of baking?

Thank you so much for helping us novices!

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Hi Nicola! What do you recommend as a substitution for the chocolate? Maybe oats? I’d typically omit but I’m curious if not including any mix ins would impact the structure you intended for this recipe!

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