We went for Classic, but the options are endless…

Two weeks in, and feelin’ fine. Or maybe not so fine. Not sure how you’re all feeling at this point in the semester, but we thought it was high time for the first BWB of the year. In all honesty, we were feeling a little homesick this week, so we took one Bwogger’s advice. What should you do when you’re feeling down? Bake something. Specifically, cookies. Warm, freshly-baked, chocolate cookies… but, as per usual, we added a twist. You’re in New York now, and if you haven’t tried a Levain cookie yet, you’re missing out. But if you’re a broke college student, as most of us are, Levain can feel like a splurge. Solution: we made our own Levain Bakery cookies!

We were craving Levain on Friday, so we found a recipe for the next best thing: copycat cookies. After making some initial edits to this recipe, as we saw fit, we began our culinary journey.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup Cold Butter, cut into small cubes (but try to soften it, if you’re like us, and don’t have a real mixer)
• 1 cup Brown Sugar
• ½ cup Sugar
• 2 Eggs
• 1½ cups Cake Flour* (*can substitute all-purpose flour for cake flour) ((but we didn’t, because we’re classy, and neither should you, because so are you.))
• 1½ cups Flour
• 1 teaspoon Cornstarch
• ¾ teaspoon Baking Soda (hint: not baking powder. don’t do it. it’ll mess everything up.)
• ¾ teaspoon Salt
• 2 cups Chocolate Chips (go for the dark chocolate, trust us)
• 2 cups Walnuts, ~roughly~ chopped

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 410 degrees. Pray to the oven gods that you don’t burn down your dorm (sorry, Res Life, *residence hall).
2. Turn on your favorite music. Ideally, 2000s jams. But truly, it’s up to you. It’s your life. (But seriously, BWBs have never not included tunes.)
3. In large mixing bowl, cream together cold cubed butter, brown sugar, and white sugar for 4 minutes, or until creamy.
4. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each one. We know you’re impatient and want to add the eggs all at once. Don’t DO it. Patience is a virtue, and what’s more virtuous than cookies?
5. Stir in flours, cornstarch, baking soda, and salt. Mix until just combined to avoid over-mixing. Stir in chocolate chips and walnuts.
6. Separate dough into large balls and place on lightly colored cookie sheet (That… seems racist. The cookie sheet can be any color, it’s fine). They are bigger than you think! (TWSS.) You will fit 4 cookies on one large cookie sheet. The dough makes 8 extra large cookies.
7. Refrigerate for at least 10 minutes… or until the oven you forgot to preheat heats up to 410 degrees. Or fridge ’em for forever
8. Bake for 9-12 minutes or until golden brown on the top. Honestly this recipe lied a little; they needed, like, 20 minutes for us. ANYWAY, when they are (finally) done, let them rest for at least 10 minutes to set. They need some R&R, ya know?
9. Enjoy! (Don’t you just love when recipes end with “Enjoy!”? So do we, so we added it.)

Levain holiness via Wikimedia Commons/Flickr