Chocolate Chip Cookie Affogato

27 CommentsThursday • May 20, 2010 • by Ari

Some recipes are so simple that I wonder whether I can really count them in a blog post. This applies to the recipe for Chocolate Chip Cookie Affogato, but in this case the results are so delectable that there was no question: I had to share. Because frankly, if you like chocolate chip cookies, whipped cream, ice cream and coffee the desire to make a glass (or bowl) of this is going to haunt you until you give in to the decadence.

You’re welcome.

I tweeted about making this yesterday and all but one of the replies I received went something like: “Affo-what?” So, to briefly explain: ”affogato” is Italian for “drowned” and the traditional version is simply vanilla ice cream or gelato doused with a hot shot of espresso. It’s not something that shows up often in the states (at least, not in my neck of the woods) but it really should.

Although the time-honored Italian version is delightful I couldn’t leave well enough alone and decided to add broken bits of chewy chocolate chip cookies, whipped cream and dark chocolate shavings to the mix. I also swapped vanilla ice cream for chocolate ice cream and since I don’t have an espresso machine went with strong coffee, brewed French press style, instead. The results? Marvelous. And I’m still calling it affogato since I drowned all the ingredients in coffee.

You could certainly use store-bought chocolate chip cookies for this dessert, but I wanted to bake so I made Alton Brown’s “chewy” chocolate chip cookies. They are everything I like in my chocolate chip cookies: they are moist, chewy, packed with semi-sweet chocolate chips and have just a touch of saltiness to follow the sweetness from the chocolate and brown sugar. AB uses bread flour to achieve the balance between firm texture and moist chewiness. I’d explain why bread flour makes all the difference but it’s easier to let AB do it. Fast forward to 5 minutes 50 seconds into the video:

We made our affogato in honor of Shavuot, which is a Jewish holiday that celebrates the giving of the Torah to the Jewish people. A Shavuot tradition I love? Eating dairy goodies like cheese, cheesecake, blintzes and ice cream. I won’t go into detail about Shavuot or the reason for this delicious tradition here, but if you’d like to learn more check out these articles I wrote on the topic: What Is Shavuot? and Why Do Jews Eat Dairy on Shavuot?

The baby is starting to get bored with his activity mat so my blog time is just about up! Tangentially, this morning he discovered the magic of kerplunk, by which I mean the sheer joy of dropping things on the floor. His favorite activity since then has been sitting on our countertop (held safely in place by mom or dad of course!) where he can reach my keys and hurl them into Oreo’s dog bowl where they make a thrilling klanging noise. I don’t know what I think about this development but I might need an affogato to deal with it.

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