On this uncommon day off from work, I finally baked Neiman Marcus cookies, which I was craving since last January. Neiman Marcus cookies are these oatmeal chocolate chip cookies with a back story of costing $250 for the recipe. I’ve had a copy of this recipe since high school but I’ve modified it to my taste.
Long story short, I rolled out 44 balls of cookie dough and baked these in 2 batches. (Oh, how I really ought to buy another cookie sheet tray or half-sheet pan!) I typically bake cookies at 350F and baked 22 cookies in the middle of a preheated oven without much thought. I definitely didn’t think that these cookies would spread much since there were a lot of dry ingredients mixed in to the butter-sugar mix. NOPE. These cookies spread quite a bit and didn’t rise that much at all. The tray almost resembled a beehive, but luckily the cookies barely touched one another. Still, I should’ve known better and bake these in 3 batches instead.
I checked my recipe card and saw that these cookies should’ve been baked in a 375F preheated oven. OOPS. I increased the temperature of the oven and baked the other 22 cookies for around the same amount of time, 11-12 minutes, rotating the tray 180 degrees around 6-7 minutes into the baking process. As I rotated the tray, I noticed that the cookies rose a bit more than those on the first tray and immediately wanted to compare these cookies after this second batch finished baking.
Alas once these cookies came out of the oven, they were almost as flat as the cookies that baked at 350F. Hypothesis proven wrong. In all of the photos on this post, the cookie on the left baked at 350F while the cookie on the right baked at 375F.
After the tray cooled a bit, I removed the cookies and noticed that these were more firm than the cookies from the first tray. A couple of the cookies that baked at 350F almost broke in half when I removed them from the baking pan. Alas when I split a cookie from each respective batch, the cookie that baked at 350F effortlessly divided in an uneven way that contoured how I held each pending half in my hands. (More pressure to split the cookie came from my left hand, leaving me with this half moon piece in my right hand.) On the other hand, the cookie that baked at 375F needed more force to split, but when it did the cookie broke more evenly than the other cookie.
The cookie that baked at 375F had a slightly crispy bite (due to the harder outside thanks to the hotter baking temperature) while the cookie that baked at 350F was generally tender. Neiman Marcus cookies contain oatmeal and both cookies had an inevitable but enjoyable chewiness as well. I prefer soft cookies in general, but I’ll definitely enjoy the harder cookie with a cup of cold milk as well, especially this one!
One of these days, I want to experiment and recreate my own picture of the same kind of cookie using different quantities/types of sweeteners, leaveners, flours, fats, etc. This kind of picture already circulates online, comparing chocolate chip cookies baked with different ingredients.
For now, I have around 40 cookies that made my apartment smell homely, invigorating me as I type this post. These cookies will slowly but surely be consumed (mostly by me) over the next week and I am elated that I finally baked these yummy Neiman Marcus cookies!
Tasty Trials and Errors 