Rosanna Pansino's Double Chocolate Twist Cookie Recipe

There's nothing quite like chocolate chip cookies. Whether you enjoy them crunchy and perfect for dunking in a glass of milk or hot and gooey straight from the oven, these sweet treats are a nostalgic joy that we never grow out of (especially during stressful times).

Now you would think the basic chocolate chip cookie recipe is pretty much set in stone, but there are many variations out there. "Nerdy Nummies" star Rosanna Pansino, for example, has her own version on this classic. And recipe developer Stephanie Rapone of Pantry to Plate has taken Pansino's recipe and added what all chocolate lovers want in any baked good: more chocolate!

You read that right. With just 15 minutes of prep and seven to nine minutes of cooking, you can create chocolate chip cookies with chocolate-flavored dough. And best of all, this recipe is good for everyone from seasoned bakers to kitchen novices.

"The method is a standard cookie method, so for anyone that's made even one scratch batch of cookies, this whole process should be familiar," Rapone said.

Now, let's get to these cookies.

Of course, any great recipe begins with the right ingredients. To make your Rosanna Pansino's chocolate chip cookies with a twist, you'll need all-purpose flour, baking soda, table (iodized) salt, vanilla extract, and two large eggs.

In addition, you'll want both granulated and light brown sugar, as well as unsalted butter. And, of course, we can't forget the star of this dessert, the chocolate. Rapone recommends cocoa powder for your dough and either semisweet or bittersweet chocolate chips. Fun fact: the difference between these two types of chips is their percentage of cacao, which is the bean that we use to make chocolate products.

After you preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit, whisk together the flour, the cocoa powder, the baking soda, and the salt in a medium bowl. Set that aside and use a hand or stand mixer to cream together the butter (which should be at room temperature), the granulated sugar, the brown sugar, and the vanilla extract in a large bowl until they are light and fluffy.

While sometimes in baking you can do a step by hand if you don't have a mixer, this is not one of those times. As recipe developer Stephanie Rapone explains, "you can't cream butter and sugar by hand."

So, at this point, you should have two bowls: a small one with your dry ingredients, and a large one with your wet ingredients. Add each of your two large eggs one at a time to your wet ingredients. It's important to make sure you mix each egg thoroughly with your mixer, otherwise, as Recipe developer Stephanie Rapone notes, "you will get strands of scrambled egg in the final product."

Using your mixer on low speed, slowly add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. If you're using a hand mixer, do this by adding about one-third of the dry ingredients and then mixing on low until they are just combined, before adding the next third and repeating the process. Rapone explains that it's important to add the dry ingredients gradually, or "they won't mix in all the way, and the recipe won't turn out."

To finish getting the dough ready for the chocolate chips, you may have to finish mixing it by hand with a spatula.  As recipe developer Stephanie Rapone points out, this is "because the dough gets really thick, and a hand mixer might not be able to do a great job for that last bit." Also, the dry ingredients tend to sit on the bottom of the bowl, which the mixer can't reach.

When your dough is fully mixed, fold in the chocolate chips with the spatula.  Remember, you need to fold the chips into the thick dough rather than attempt to mix them.

If you've followed the above steps, your dough is now ready for the oven. Line a baking sheet with either parchment paper or a non-stick baking mat. Scoop approximately two tablespoonfuls of dough for each cookie onto the baking sheet, spacing them two inches apart.

Although you can use a regular tablespoon for this part of the recipe, recipe developer Stephanie Rapone likes using a one-ounce disher. For anyone unfamiliar, a disher resembles a metal ice cream scoop and is used to measure out perfectly portioned amounts of (in this case) cookie dough. By using a disher, your cookies will be the same size and shape.

Bake your cookies in the oven for seven to nine minutes, until the edges look set, and the tops have a more, "dry" appearance. And this brings us to one of the challenges of chocolate-flavored dough cookies.

When baking traditional chocolate chip cookies, you'll notice the cookies' edge becoming a bit brown when they're done. Unfortunately, the rich, brown color of Rosanna Pansino's chocolate chip cookies with a twist makes that baking check all but impossible. This is why the appearance of the tops of the cookies is so important, or as recipe developer Stephanie Rapone puts it, "if the dough is still super shiny, that would indicate it still has a lot of moisture and isn't done baking yet."

Once that chocolately smell starts wafting from the oven, you may be tempted to dive right into those cookies. However, you should let them sit on the baking sheet for one minute to cool. After that, you can transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Also, for any first-time cookie-bakers out there who may be concerned about their cookies being underdone, recipe developer Stephanie Rapone offers this advice: "If you aren't sure if they are done, and it's been nine minutes, pull them out and let them cool for 10 minutes and taste one. If not cooked, then adjust the cooking time on the next batch you put in the oven, since not all of the cookies will likely fit in the oven at the same time."