Original Nestle Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookies

A community recipe by Psappha

Not tested or verified by Nigella.com

Print me

Introduction

As far as I can tell, this recipe is not yet available on Nigella.com's recipe database; as it really is the original chocolate chip cookie recipe, I thought it was a necessary addition. Chocolate Chip Cookies were accidentally discovered at the Toll House Inn in the 1930s. The bakers were trying to make ordinary butter cookies into chocolate cookies by adding Nestle chocolate chunks (another relatively new 'invention' at the time), assuming that the chocolate would melt in the oven and thereby permeate the whole cookie. Instead, chocolate chip cookies were born. Nestle then bought the recipe from the Inn's owner and prints it on the back of every package of Nestle chocolate chips.

Ingredients

Serves: 12

Metric Cups

315 grams plain flour
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1 teaspoon salt
220 grams butter (softened)
150 grams sugar
150 grams brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs
350 grams semi-sweet chocolate morsels

11⅛ ounces all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
7¾ ounces butter (softened)
5⅓ ounces sugar
5⅓ ounces brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs
12⅜ ounces semi-sweet chocolate morsels

Method

Original Nestle Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookies is a community recipe submitted by Psappha and has not been tested by Nigella.com so we are not able to answer questions regarding this recipe.

Preheat oven to 375F/190C/Gas Mark 5.

In a small bowl, combine flour, bicarbonate of soda, and salt.

In a mixing bowl, cream together the butter and the two sugars. Add the vanilla extract. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

Gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in chocolate chips.

Drop dough by rounded tablespoons onto baking sheets.

Bake for 9-11 minutes, or until golden brown.

Preheat oven to 375F/190C/Gas Mark 5.

In a small bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and salt.

In a mixing bowl, cream together the butter and the two sugars. Add the vanilla extract. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

Gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in chocolate chips.

Drop dough by rounded tablespoons onto baking sheets.

Bake for 9-11 minutes, or until golden brown.

Additional Information

Nestle's recipe also calls for 1 cup (approx 150g?) of chopped nuts to be stirred into mixture along with the chocolate. I have never done this--just the chocolate for my family! Also, I always reduce the flour by about 1/2 cup/70g as I prefer the cookies less floury. Eat them hot, warm, or cold. My father always has them straight from the oven, plunged into a soup bowl of milk...they do make sizzle wonderfully this way!

Tell us what you think

What 4 Others have said

Here's a link to the Nestle's Toll House Cookies recipe: https://www.verybestbaking.com/toll-house/recipes/original-nestle-toll-house-chocolate-chip-cookies/

I checked with the Nestle's baking expert. They measure all-purpose flour at 125g/cup.

The recipe in the original post calls for 140g/cup. That's over 10% more flour than Nestle's recipe calls for.

Here is Nestle's recipe converted to weight based measurements:

281 g all-purpose flour 1 tsp baking soda 1 tsp salt 227 g butter (softened) 150 g granulated sugar 161 g brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract 2 large eggs, room temperature 340 g semi-sweet chocolate morsels 1 cup chopped nuts (Optional. If omitting, add 16g all-purpose flour.)

Here is a baking ingredients calculator built by a professionally trained baker and a statistician: https://bakingcalculators.com/Default.aspx

The calculator assumes 120g/cup of all-purpose (plain) white flour so I made the adjustments to reflect Nestle's ratio.

Posted by A_Baker on 21st June 2022
Another American abroad here. I’m currently 6 months pregnant and all I want to eat is the comfort food from my childhood. This recipe definitely is the Tollhouse recipe I grew up with, and makes it easy to make when measuring cups and sticks of butter are replaced with scales (which imho, is a far more accurate way to cook). I found that turning my fan assisted oven down to 165-170 made a huge difference in achieving a fluffy, chewy cookie.

Posted by He09adless on 15th November 2020
This recipe is not great, I found the butter content far too high and the cookies spread out on the pan. The conversion is right so its not the recipe translation thats the issue just the recipe itself. Wouldnt make again and will try Nigellas own chocolate chip cookie recipe out next time as the butter is half the amount. American butter is traditionally lower in fat content than European butter so it would make sense that a direct swap wouldnt be appropriate as you're dealing with way more butterfat in European butter than american butter. The cookies tasted fine. Nothing to go crazy over.

Posted by QueenC on 30th April 2020
I would just like to say, I love you for this post! I'm an American in France and have misplaced my measuring cups. I started typing in google frantically to see about converting the recipe, and this came up. It worked out wonderfully although I added a little more flour. I always throw in 2 spoonfulls of dough in the oven to test a recipe first and they came out flat. Might be the flour in France... Anyhow, thank you again!

Posted by hungryman5 on 16th November 2019