Recipe: miso toffee apple cookies

Brown butter cookie dough with tastes of butterscotch and soft bites of apple. The perfect gooey and crunchy cookie.

I would go so far as to say that these are some of the best cookies that I have made. I had leftover miso toffee on hand, and a bounty of apples to work my way through before we left Sweden to go home for Christmas. The idea of putting fresh fruit into a cookie had never occured to me before now–why use fruit when you could use chocolate?–but once the idea of toffee apple cookies came to my mind, it sounded like a tremendous idea. Together with the brown sugar and brown butter, the miso toffee produces the most amazing butterscotch flavour and subtle chew, and the pieces of apple provide little soft bites and added moisture that ensures the inside of these cookies are so gloriously gooey, with golden, crunchy edges–a must for me.

If you made the miso toffee for the sablés that I posted as part of my Christmas cookie posts, then you will have plenty left over for these cookies. If not, I will detail how to make the toffee below, or you could use a good quality shop-bought toffee.

Makes 14

Ingredients

butter 165g to make 140g brown butter
caster sugar 90g
light brown sugar 140g
egg 1, medium-sized
egg yolks 2, medium-sized
vanilla 1/2 tbsp extract or 1/2 vanilla pod seeds
plain flour 210g
baking powder 4g
baking soda 2g
ground cinnamon 1/2 tsp
flaky sea salt a generous pinch, plus more to finish
miso toffee 75g, recipe below, crushed into pieces no bigger than 1-2cm
apple 75g, peeled and chopped into 1cm cubes

For the miso toffee:
butter 58g
light brown sugar 100g
white miso paste 20g

1. Line a medium-sized baking tray with foil and set aside.

2. Add the butter to a medium-sized pot and place on medium heat to melt. Add the brown sugar and miso paste and whisk well to combine. Bring to a gentle boil, whisking continuously, until the mixture becomes a rich brown, or until it reaches 280F on a food thermometer. Once ready, pour the toffee onto your prepared baking tray and spread into a thin layer with a spatula. Leave to cool to room temperature, then place in the fridge to harden.

3. Once hardened, break the toffee up a little so that you can place it into a ziplock bag. Use a rolling pin or wooden spoon to smash the toffee into small pieces, no larger than 1-2cm.

Store leftover toffee in a sealed container in the fridge, where it will last up to three weeks.

For the cookies:
1. Add the butter to a small pot over medium-heat. Heat until the butter has melted, then continue to cook while stirring often with a spatula, scraping the bottom of the pot so that the milk solids do not stick. Cook the butter until it begins to foam and has the aroma of toasted brown butter, then immediately remove from the heat and leave to cool for 5-10 minutes.

2. To a large bowl, add the caster sugar and light brown sugar and whisk together. Add the melted brown butter, making sure to scrape all of the browned milk solids out of the pot, and whisk until combined. Add the whole egg and whisk until homogenous and slightly lighter in colour, then add the egg yolks and vanilla and continue to whisk until slightly voluminous and a light caramel colour, 2-3 minutes.

3. To a seperate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, ground cinnamon and flaky sea salt and whisk together. Add this mixture to the butter/sugar/egg mixture and fold gently but thoroughly with a spatula until half-way combined, then add the miso toffee pieces and cubed apple and continue to mix just until there are no signs of flour and the toffee and apple pieces are well distributed. Place the cookie dough in a sealable container (or a bowl which you can cover with cling film), cover and place in the fridge overnight.

To bake:
1. When ready to bake, preheat your oven to 170C fan and line a baking tray with baking paper–we’re going to bake the cookies in 4 batches. Remove the cookie dough from the fridge and portion into balls 70-75g in weight. Place 3 dough balls onto the prepared baking tray and put the rest into the freezer. Ensure the cookies are well spaced out, and bake for 15 minutes. Due to the high liquid content from the apples, the cookies do tend to spread a bit–I used a butter knife to shape the cookies back into circles as soon as they came out of the oven. Doing this also helps to create a crunchier edge. Once baked, sprinkle each cookie with a little bit of flaky sea salt and leave to cool on the baking tray for 5-10 minutes after baking, before transferring to a cooling rack to cool completely. Continue with the rest of the cookies.

The cookie dough can be kept in the fridge for 2-3 days, and can kept in the freezer for 6-12 months. The baked cookies should be stored in a sealed container in the fridge, with a piece of baking paper between each cookie (they’re sticky!) and left at room temperature for 5-10 minutes before serving.