Whole Wheat Cookies

Quenching our  sweet thirst. Do you remember when L.A. was a dessert desert? When a few sparse bakeries that baked from scratch existed, and took an hour to get to in traffic? We've come a long way, sweet babies, and we have a handful of people to thank for it. I had the great pleasure. Nope. Let me rephrase this. I spent an evening pinching myself. I sat next to, across from and in shared space with bakers and food mavens I have admired for a decade. Transformative folks whose vision, above all else, is to elevate this city's sweet palate and teach us the ways of the craft. We talked bread, grain, chocolate, beer and the future. For the record, the future looks really, really yummy. We have loved hosting some of L.A.'s best pastry chefs in our kitchen, and this year, we thought we would invite them to teach the next generation of bakers. This fall, our Pro Pastry Series will be enhanced with guest Chef Instructors, from Evan Kleiman for our Pro Pastry 1 Pie class (morningsor evenings) to Cooks County's Roxana Jullapat as our Pro Pastry 3 Puff Pastry master. Our Pro Pastry 2 students will get a class with our favorite confectioner Valerie Gordon of Valerie Confections. So what now? Who is going to take it to the next level? Culinary students? Bloggers, bakers and tinkerers? You?   In the spirit of baking forward, we've got another recipe using the newest stone-ground, whole grain locally grown wheat. Our handful of Pro Pastry Intensive students were given a bag of whole grain flour at the farmers market yesterday with a challenge: Bake these cookies using Kim Boyce'schocolate chip cookies from Good to the Grain. Use good, dark chocolate. Um, ok.   Whole Wheat Cookies  Adapted from Good to the Grain by Kim Boyce Place the bowl of a stand mixer: 2 sticks (8 ounces) unsalted butter 1 cup sugar (preferably unbleached) 3/4 cup brown sugar 1/4 cup muscovado sugar (or dark brown sugar) Set aside: 2 eggs 1 tsp fine sea salt 8 ounces bittersweet chocolate, roughly chopped 1/2 cup chopped hazelnuts or pecans (optional) Whisk together in a small bowl: 2-3/4 cups whole wheat flour (whole grain, stone ground is best) 1-1/2 tsps baking powder 1 tsp baking soda 1. Cream the butter and sugars until lighter in color. Most recipes call for the butter to be room temperature, but straight out of the fridge will do so long as you cream it well. 2. Add the eggs and salt and combined until smooth. Add the chocolate (and nuts, if desired), and mix for a moment until combined. 3. Add the dry ingredients all at once. Mix until just combined. 4. Scoop onto parchment-paper lined cookie sheets at least 2" apart. Bake at 350 until just golden on the edges. Remove from the oven and let them finish baking and cooling on the cookie sheet. Wishing you a delicious day,  Clémence and Hadley