Gluten-Free Buckwheat-Hazelnut Chocolate Chip Cookies
My fellow Great American Baking Show contestants each came up with an original chocolate chip cookie recipe. Then we each made another baker’s recipe and put together this fun little video!
Here’s my recipe. Being me, it’s full of whole grains, nuts, and other goodness.
Beurre noisette is the French term for deeply browned butter. Noisette means hazelnut in French, so it makes sense to combine brown butter with roasted hazelnuts. The earthy buckwheat flour pairs beautifully with both hazelnuts and chocolate. If you’re taking things that far, why not go all the way and make these totally gluten free?
Makes about 12 cookies.
Ingredients:
115 g (1/2 cup) unsalted butter
150 g (1 ½ cups) light brown sugar or light muscovado sugar
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 large egg, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
15 g (2 Tablespoons) tapioca flour
65 g sweet rice flour (like Mochiko or Bob’s Red Mill)
65 g buckwheat flour
¼ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon xanthan gum (optional, for chewier cookies)
150 g chopped dark chocolate or dark chocolate chips
100 g hazelnuts, toasted and chopped
50 g hulled buckwheat groats (optional, for sprinkling on top)
Instructions
Brown the butter: Put the butter into a small saucepan over medium heat for 3-4 minutes. The butter will melt, then bubble. Watch it closely: when the butter gets quiet (the water has boiled off), turn it down to low and stir it with a heatproof spatula. When you see nice hazelnut-brown bits on the bottom of the pan and it smells nutty, pour the butter and all of the brown bits into a large mixing bowl.
Add the brown sugar and salt to the hot butter. Whisk the mixture until combined and lump-free. Let it cool until it feels about body temperature, then whisk in the egg and vanilla until smooth.
In a separate mixing bowl, combine the tapioca flour, sweet rice flour, buckwheat flour, baking soda, salt, and xanthan gum (if using). Whisk for about 1 minute until thoroughly combined.
Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and whisk to combine. Switch to a wooden spoon or flexible spatula and mix in the chocolate and chopped hazelnuts. Cover the mixing bowl and refrigerate for at least 12 hours, up to 24 hours.
When you’re ready to bake, heat the oven to 375F/180C with a rack in the middle of the oven. Line baking sheet with parchment. Scoop the dough into balls that are about 2-3 tablespoons of dough (you should have about 12 balls), then put six of them on the baking sheet about 3” apart. Sprinkle the top of each cookie with about 1 tsp of buckwheat groats and gently press them into the cookie. Bake at 375F/180C for 10-12 minutes . You can tell they’re done because the bottom edges of the cookies will start to brown. Err on the side of under-baking these—everyone loves a gooey cookie. Repeat the baking with the remaining six dough balls.
Pro Tips:
Make ahead: You can keep the dough in the refrigerator for up to 24 hours. You can freeze the cookie dough balls for up to 3 months. If baking from chilled or frozen, let the cookies sit on the lined baking sheet at room temperature while your oven heats up.
Don't want to make the cookies gluten free? Swap out the tapioca flour and sweet rice flour for 80 grams of all-purpose flour and omit the xanthan gum.
