Gochujang Caramel Cookies
Curiosity piqued. An exploration of flavor fusions.I saw this recipe while I was exploring the NYT cooking website and it immediately drew my attention. Gochujang in cookies? I always joked to friends that I would make them a kimchi flavored cake or dessert, yet never actually went through with it. It was a joke haha. But upon trying this recipe out and finding it interesting, I thought to myself, “Hmmm… maybe someday I will.” I’ve always added korean flavors in to savory foods such as kimchi in quesadillas and gochujang in cream sauces, yet I never thought of adding them into a cookie.
Ingredients
makes around 9 large cookies
115 grams (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 heaping tablespoon gochujang
200 grams (1 cup) granulated sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
185 grams (1 1/2 cups) all-purpose flour
Directions
Stir together 1 tablespoon butter (taken from the 115g of butter), 2tbsp brown sugar, and 1tbsp gochujang in a small bowl. Set aside.
In a large bow, whisk together 6tbsp butter (make sure its at room temperature/soft), 200g sugar, egg, 1/2tsp salt, 1/4tsp cinnamon, and 1tsp vanilla extract until smooth. Using a spatula, fold in the 1/2tsp baking soda. Then add 185g flour and gently combine. Eric recommends refrigerating the dough at this point for 15-20 minutes to firm it up a bit. I skipped this step haha.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
Spoon the gochujang mixture onto the cookie dough in 3-4 spaced out blobs. Using your spatula, make swirls into the cookie dough to create streaks with the gochujang mixture. You don’t want the gochujang to combine with the dough. You want to create a ripple effect.
Using a 1/4-cup ice cream scoop, scoop out your cookie dough onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper. These cookies spread quite a bit so I only place 5 cookies onto each sheet.
Place into the oven and bake for 11-13 minutes (this is what is suggested in the recipe but mine took a bit longer at around 15 minutes). You want to bake the cookies until they get lightly golden at the edges and set in the center. Let cool on the baking sheet and enjoy!
My cookies definitely don’t look as good as Eric’s. You should definitely follow what he does! There’s a video on youtube posted by NYT cooking with detailed instructions and visuals.
Her'e’s the recipe I used:
https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1023675-gochujang-caramel-cookies
