These Double Chocolate Chip Cookies are soft and chewy, and become almost fudgy when fully cooled, with a truly intense and totally dark chocolate flavor!

Ever since I can remember, this has been my go-to chocolate chip cookie recipe. Although originally, it wasn’t exactly like that. I started making these double chocolate chip cookies when I was still a very young adult, from the recipe that I’d found on the side of a package of golden shortening.

Since I wasn’t a fan of the nasty smelling and artificial tasting stuff to start with, it wasn’t long before I started making changes to the recipe. Of course, the first ingredient to be given the boot had been the artificially colored and flavored, yellow greasy stuff. I’ve always much preferred to use real butter, thank you very much.

But then, I had to make a few other modifications to compensate for the change that I’d just made… 

If I remember correctly, the original recipe also called for the addition of milk, contained way too few chocolate chips and didn’t even include nuts. Plus, the batter itself was not chocolaty enough for my taste. It definitely needed a little bit more cocoa powder!

For a couple of years, I would make a new batch pretty much every month, in an attempt to come up with the perfect recipe. While I can’t say that I ever actually found it (you see, there’s this thing with me where I seem to always want to modify my recipes every time I make them, just to see if I couldn’t improve on them even more…) I think that I’m pretty darn close.

These bite size cookies have the perfect texture, if you ask me: they’re really soft on the interior, yet they’re slightly crispy on the exterior. They are soft and chewy, and become almost fudgy when fully cooled. As for their flavor, it is truly intense and totally dark chocolate!

And finally, each cookie procures a very satisfying amount of chocolate chips and chopped pecans in every single bite!

Yet, if I was to make them again, I would probably make a few other substitutions… Like what, you ask? Well, for starters, I would try using brown butter instead of plain butter, and I’d probably push the envelope to see if I couldn’t make room for even more chocolate chips: I think a few little white dots would look totally great in there…

Mostly, though, I need to find a way to make them look prettier… ‘cuz while these babies TASTE totally delicious, I don’t think that they would place really well in any given cookie beauty contest. I’m hoping that I can improve that aspect some…

In the meantime, don’t hesitate for even one second to whip up a batch, as they stand right now. I guarantee that you and your lucky loved ones will be entirely satisfied (and probably totally addicted, too! For that, I apologize…or not!)

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Step-by-Step instructions & pictures

This recipe yields 5 dozen cookies, which may seem like a lot, but trust me when I say that you don’t really want to go for a half-batch.

For starters, they freeze really well, either cooked or raw (more on that later) but also too, they disappear so fast, if you choose to cut the recipe in half you will seriously regret not making a full batch.

Plus, they’re small cookies, you know… well, smallish… sort of… so that means you get to eat more!

Let’s get going and start with our usual mise-en-place

In a medium mixing bowl, combine the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt.

Chop your pecans and put them in a separate bowl, together with the chocolate chips.

Get 2 large eggs out of the refrigerator. You don’t HAVE to crack them into a bowl like I did, but that’s always a good idea. It prevents inadvertently dropping a piece of egg shell in your batter, or worse, throwing a bad egg in there (although in over 25 years of baking, the latter has never happened to me. But hey, better safe then sorry, right?)

Next, in the bowl of your stand mixer, combine the butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar and vanilla extract .

Equip the paddle attachment and beat the butter and sugar on medium speed for about 2 minutes, or until creamy.

Add the eggs and resume beating on medium speed, until the eggs are completely incorporated.

You can add both eggs at the same time, there’s no need to beat between each addition…

Just make sure you scrape the sides of the bowl once the eggs have been incorporated and then resume beating until well blended.

Mix the the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt together with a flat whisk, until completely incorporated.

Add to the creamed mixture and beat the cookie dough on low speed for about 1 minute or until well blended.

Add the chopped pecans and chocolate chips and mix again on low speed until just incorporated, no more.

Transfer your finished cookie dough to the refrigerator for at least one hour, or up to overnight.

If you’re going to let your batter sit in the fridge overnight, you might want to cover it with a plastic film…

When ready to bake your cookies, preheat your oven to 350°F and line a 13″ x 18″ baking sheet with parchment paper

Drop the cookie dough by the tablespoonful on the prepared cookie sheet, leaving about 3 inches between the cookies to allow for spreading. I strongly recommend that you use a spring-loaded ice cream scoop for this, as it ensures your cookies will be uniformly shaped and will all cook at the same time.

I like to pre-scoop all my cookie dough while my first batch of cookies is in the oven. That way, as the cookies come out of the oven, all I have to do is place the little balls of dough on the baking sheet and send it right back into the oven.

And remember how I said that you could freeze the raw batter, if you wanted to? Well, now would be the time to do this.

Simply align the pre-scooped balls of dough on a small baking sheet lined with a piece of parchment paper and place them in the freezer until they are frozen solid and then transfer them to an airtight container or zip bag.

That way, when you’re in the mood for a fresh oven baked cookie, all you have to do is take the number of dough balls that you want out of the freezer, let them thaw in the fridge for a couple of hours and then bake them just like you would fresh cookies.

See? I told you you wanted to make that full batch…

Bake the cookies for precisely 8 minutes; they will still be VERY soft and moist as you take them out of the oven, but they will firm up as they cool down.

With that in mind, let the cookies cool for 2 minutes on the baking sheet before even attempting to touch them. Once they have cooled sufficiently, remove the cookies to a cooling rack to cool completely.

And try to resist the urge to eat them all before you even have a chance to put them away…

Store the cooled cookies in an airtight container for up to a few weeks (yeah, like that’s gonna happen) or freeze them for up to a few months. Be warned, though: if you are sending your baked cookies to the freezer in an attempt to make them last longer, know that they are also totally delicious right out of the freezer.

Sure, you can thank me for that!

And for the Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookie porn that follows…