Momofuku Milk Bar's Compost Cookie

Momofuku Milk Bar is a bakery in New York City, and their recipes have made the rounds of television and the blogosphere. I’d come across their Compost Cookie recipe online and had also seen their Crack Pie on a television show. After watching the show about the pie, I decided to investigate a bit more and I bookmarked the recipe for their Compost Cookies.

What I love about this cookie is that it leaves some ingredients up to your choosing. You are supposed to use 1-1/2 cups of baking ingredients and 1-1/2 cups of snack foods. For the snack food I really wanted to include potato chips, and luckily I almost always have a random bag of chips from some boxed lunch or another. I also had a Toblerone bar that I wanted to use. I just aimed for 3 cups of mix-ins, so I don’t have precise measurements. I used a combination of chopped up Toblerone bar, milk chocolate chips, caramel bits, chopped hazelnuts and potato chips. I figured all of those would be tasty together.

I refrigerated the dough for over 24 hours, but I still had a little trouble baking these up. The first batch I had put on the cookie sheets and set them on the counter for the last 5 minutes while the oven preheated. Big mistake! They spread like crazy and didn’t look good at all. I made sure I kept the dough in the refrigerator until the second I put them in the oven to bake. This helped but there was still a problem with the dough spreading. Regardless, they are super tasty! I can’t say that you can pick out each individual add-in, but together these cookies are great. I especially liked the caramel bits and the Toblerone bar. Unlike most of the cookies that I take to work, these stayed at home (other than the ones I took to my ballet teacher) and they all disappeared!

Momofuku Milk Bar's Compost Cookie

1 cup butter , softened
1 cup sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon corn syrup (or honey)
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
1 3/4 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 cups baking ingredients (options: chocolate chips, nuts, etc.)
1 1/2 cups snack foods (chips, pretzels, etc.)

In a large mixer bowl, cream butter, sugar, brown sugar, and corn syrup/honey on medium high for two to three minutes until fluffy and pale yellow in color. Scrape down the bowl. Add the vanilla and eggs and stir on low to combine. Increase mixer speed to medium high and mix for 10 minutes. The mixture will become an almost pale white color and your creamed mixture will double in size.

With the mixer on low, add the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Mix just until the dough comes together and all remnants of dry ingredients have incorporated, which for me took about 30 seconds. Do not over mix. Add the mix-ins and mix on low just until combined.

Using a large cookie scoop, scoop the dough onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Cover the cookie sheet with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour, or up to one week. (Do not bake these cookies at room temperature!)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line baking sheets with silicone baking mats.

Take the plastic wrap off of the cookies and place the dough on the prepared baking sheets. While in the oven, the cookies will puff, crackle and spread. Bake 9 to 11 minutes, until browned on the edges and beginning to brown in the center. Cool the cookies completely on the sheet pan.

Recipe from Christina Tosi via Amateur Gourmet