I Tried Jennifer Garner’s Most Beloved “Cloud Cookies”

Who doesn’t love a superb baking fail? Whereas it’s endearing to observe our favourite celebs bake a few of their favourite treats over on social media, I’ve to confess, it’s much more entertaining to observe them fail on digital camera as properly. It makes them really feel a little extra regular — like the remainder of us — so I couldn’t assist however love the latest cookie-baking fail Jennifer Garner posted on her Instagram.

The well-known actress was making a batch of Sarabeth’s Cloud Cookies, and whereas she made the method look seamless, she ended up with slightly flat, brown cookies on the finish. So how did that occur? Effectively, she skimped on utilizing the superfine sugar that the recipe requires. By the tip of the video when she made her second try, you may inform that the superfine sugar made all of the distinction for this explicit chocolate chip cookie.

Superfine sugar (also called caster sugar) is a finely floor sugar that’s meant for baking ethereal desserts, type of like these cloud cookies. Curious if these cookies actually would change into that ethereal when baking them, I made a decision to offer the recipe a strive for myself. Evidently, I felt like I used to be biting into sugary, buttery air in a great way, in fact!

Preheat the oven to 350 levels, ensuring one of many racks is on the middle or prime third of your oven. Line a half-sheet pan with parchment paper and put aside.

In a medium-sized mixing bowl, sift collectively 1 1/3 cups of superfine sugar and 1 1/3 cup of sunshine brown sugar.

In one other medium-sized mixing bowl, sift collectively 2 cups of unbleached all-purpose flour, 3/4 teaspoon of baking soda, and 1/4 teaspoon of sea salt. 

Utilizing an electrical mixer, beat one cup of room temperature unsalted butter (the equal of two sticks) on excessive velocity for a few minute, till it’s easy. Steadily add within the sugar combination, then toss in 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract. Beat the sugar/butter combination for 5 minutes, stopping to scrape the edges often, till the combination is a light-weight brown and fluffy texture; this could take about 5 minutes. Steadily add in two room temperature eggs and beat them in. 

Slowly sprinkle within the dry elements till simply mixed. As soon as every thing is included, take away the dough from the electrical mixer and gently fold in 2 cups of toasted sliced almonds, and two cups of chocolate chips. 

Scoop a 2-inch sized cookie dough ball and place onto the ready baking sheet. Make sure you give the cookies sufficient room — they’ll get a lot larger. I like to recommend baking eight cookies per sheet pan to offer them sufficient house. 

Bake the cookies for 12 minutes first. Take away the pan from the oven, then gently wrap the pan on a floor to barely deflate the cookies and provides them that signature crinkle look. Place the cookies again within the oven and bake for one more 3 minutes. Take away the pan from the oven and let the cookies cool on the pan earlier than eradicating to a cooling rack.

I’ve to confess, I used to be actually skeptical about making these cookies after seeing Jennifer Garner’s baking fail on Instagram. Would they really work properly, or was I certain to have tremendous flat, tremendous burnt cookies by the tip of this recipe?

Seems, the superfine sugar actually is the trick to creating the proper cloud cookies. The batter for these cookies was fluffy and cloudy, and the feel of the cookies mirrored it. Every chew was crispy, but there have been little air pockets all through that gave it that “cloud-like” texture that they’re so famously named after. Whereas the steps for correctly beating the sugar, butter, and eggs could seem a bit tedious, I promise you, you’ll wish to undergo with the meticulous steps to get this texture.

Additionally, whereas the recipe does name for fairly a couple of chocolate chips and almonds, don’t be afraid. At first I assumed it was a bit an excessive amount of, however the cookies unfold out fairly a bit, so that you’re not simply biting into almonds and chocolate chips with every chew; the feel continues to be good. 

As for the style, I admit, I type of needed a trace of extra salt. I like a superb salty chocolate chip cookie, and I really feel like this simply didn’t have as a lot as I’d have desired. After giving these cookies a check, I made a decision to bake them with a sprinkle of salt on the underside so every chew might have that further zing of salt — which is actually how I make all of my chocolate chip cookies in any case.