Compost Cookies

I just participated in the 3rd Annual Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap. It’s an exciting program, hosted by Lindsay of Love and Olive Oil and Julie of The Little Kitchen, which brings together food bloggers from around the world “in celebration of all things scrumptious”. The premise of the program is quite simple. I baked delicious home made cookies and sent a dozen of each to three other assigned food bloggers.  In return, I received three dozen cookies from three separate food bloggers: Pecan Cookies from Cats and Commas; Date Pinwheels from Kettler Cuisine; Glazed Lemon Cookies from Mamas Gotta Bake;

The best part about this program is its partnership with Cookies for Kids’ Cancer, a national non-profit organization committed to funding new therapies used in the fight against pediatric cancer, which claims the lives of more children in the US than any other disease. By participating in this cookie swap I not only contributed to the food blogger community, but also supported yet another great cause.

In total, $13,778.40 was raised this year through participation fees, extra donations, and contributions from the generous brand partners who matched our donations, dollar for dollar: OXO, Dixie Crystals, Grandma’s Molasses and Gold Medal Flour.

For my contribution, I decided to create a COMPOST COOKIE recipe that was inspired by Christina Tosi, head pastry chef from celebrated Momofuku Milk Bar in NYC.  Last winter I attended a holiday event, hosted by Christina, where I was able to sample and replicate a bunch of her crazy creative sweets like: Fruity Pebble Marshmallow cookies, Blueberry Cream Cookies, Confetti Cookies, and Corn Cookies.  I knew I wanted to recreate a version of her Compost Cookies for the cookie swap.

I love Compost Cookies because no two cookies will ever taste the same.  As the baker, you can get as creative as you want with the ingredients. That’s right, you can literally use whatever you have on hand to develop your recipe.  Since I was baking with my son, we decided to make batches of the cookie using his favorite snacks from the cupboard.

And, as we started combining ingredients, we kept throwing in more – hence the nickname “garbage cookies” or “kitchen sink cookies”.  In our version, we added: dried cranberries, potato chips, pretzels, mini marshmallows, and white chocolate chips to Milk Bar’s cookie base batter.

our compost ingredients

Our final cookies were spectacularly crisp.  Each bite yielded a new surprise.  Would it be crunchy, or sweet, or savory?

We can’t wait to come up with our next batch.  Maybe we’ll add some Graham Crackers and old-fashioned rolled oats to the mix?  Perhaps some raisins and butterscotch chips?  The possibilities are endless.

not your average batter

ready to bake

Couple helpful hints for the batter:

• Be careful not to over mix the cookies or it will break too many of the pretzels and potato chips (if you decide to use them in your recipe).  Just mix so that your ingredients are “just incorporated” into the dough.
• If using potato chips, pick a chip that isn’t paper thin so that they do not break apart too much in the mixing process.
• Christina’s recipe calls for glucose which I didn’t have so I substituted it with 1 tablespoon of corn syrup instead.
• Christina lists the ingredients in grams. I used my kitchen scale to weigh the quantities to be more exact.  You can use the American unit of measurement indicated in the recipe too.
• I followed Christina’s batter instructions and made sure to refrigerate the dough for at least one hour before baking (she also says you can refrigerate up to one week). Apparently if you bake these cookies at room temperature they will not bake properly.
• It’s important to arrange the cookies a minimum of 4 inches apart per Christina’s instructions.  Heed these instructions. My first batch of cookies was a disaster as all of my cookies merged into one.

Enjoy composting with your cookies!