Why Bitter Rye Flour Is A Perfect Match For Chocolate Chip Cookies

From adding a sourdough starter to including instant pudding mix into raw cookie dough, there are plenty of ways to upgrade your favorite chocolate chip cookie recipes. Sprinkles of cayenne can add a flavorful, surprising punch to your next baker's dozen, and experimenting with the type of flour you use can add extra bendiness and flavorful depth to even the most basic cookie dough. Chef Alton Brown uses bread flour to bake chewier cookies, as the slightly higher protein content of bread flour brings elasticity and strength to dough mixtures. If you also like cookies with extra bite, rye flour is another substitute that can impart satisfying elements to cookies taken fresh out of the oven. 

You'll notice a toothier texture when biting into cookies made with rye flour, and flavors like cinnamon, ginger, and caramel can seem amplified in the presence of the nutty notes of rye flour. Although it might be easier to associate rye with bread, incorporating this flour into cookie recipes comes with several upsides for cookie lovers, and the malty flavors and noticeable chewiness of cookies made with rye may make it difficult to return to your usual cookie routine.

Rye flour brings golden brightness to cookies — and that's before you get chewing. Packing fiber and B vitamins, rye not only delivers nutritional benefits but the sour flavors of the flour contrast brilliantly with the sweetness of chocolate and other added ingredients like caramel or honey. This dichotomy of flavors deepens the overall cookie experience, just as a sprinkle of crunchy salt can turn up the volume of a regularly-made cookie.

While many cookie recipes require refrigeration prior to baking, rye doesn't call for the same step, as the flour instantly introduces the kind of gritty texture that other flours take time to present. The composition of rye is different than other flour varieties, so you'll notice a more savory bite in both the raw dough and baked batches of treats. Plus, since rye holds moisture for a longer amount of time than other flour types, the cookies you make will stay fresher for longer when compared to cookies made with basic wheat flour.

For moments you crave cookies immediately, rye flour can fast-track your efforts to mix cookie dough and have a batch of cookies ready to enjoy alongside afternoon cups of coffee. If you're not convinced, substitute a portion of the flour called for in your cookies' recipe with rye and decide to increase the amount for the next batch bake after eating the first round.