Pistachio White Chocolate Cookies

I like to use a combination of both white sugar and light brown muscovado sugar in these white chocolate and pistachio cookies. The brown sugar adds just a touch of molasses flavour to the cookies.

These cookies are a simple bake, ideal for all levels of baker, and perfect for anyone who wants to enjoy a day's baking with children or grandchildren.

Recipe ingredients

• Sugar: I use a combination of granulated and light muscovado sugar as it has a great molasses flavour that really works in these cookies. A good substitution would be soft light brown sugar or a golden caster sugar.
• Butter: I use unsalted butter, but you could also use salted butter. Don’t be tempted to use margarine as you won’t get the same flavour or set in the cookies.
• Vanilla Extract: adds great flavour to these cookies, you could also use vanilla paste. Vanilla essence would also work but it doesn't have the same depth of flavor.
• Eggs: use 1 large beaten eggs in this recipe as it helps to bind the cookie dough.
• Flour: plain flour (all purpose) is used in this recipe.
• Bicarbonate of Soda: is added to give the cookies a little rise and create a light, soft cookie.
• Chocolate Chips: I use white chocolate chips in this recipe. You could also use a bar of white chocolate and chop it up.
• Pistachios: add great crunch to these chocolate cookies. I use unsalted pistachios and shell them myself (it's a lot cheaper than buying shelled nuts). If you use salted nuts leave out the pinch of salt when making the cookie dough.

How to make Pistachio White Chocolate Cookies

• Preheat the oven to 190C/170CFan/375F.
• Place the pistachios in a sealed plastic bag and bash up gently with a rolling pin to create small chunks of nut.
• Place the butter and both sugars into a bowl and beat well until the mixture becomes creamy.
• Once you have beaten the butter and sugars together, beat in the vanilla extract and the egg, mixing well to combine.

• Add the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt to the bowl and continue to mix well until you have a rough dough.
• Add the pistachios and chocolate chips to the dough.

• Mix until you have a well combined dough.
• Pull together small golf ball sized balls of the cookie dough and place these on a tray lined with baking parchment. Space the cookies well apart as they will spread in the oven. However, do not flatten out the balls of dough.
• Optional: At this stage if you think the cookie dough is too soft you can pop the tray into the fridge for 10 minutes to allow the dough to chill a little.
• Once you have shaped all the cookies place the trays into the hot oven. Bake the cookies for 10-12 minutes, they should be golden and a little soft in the middle.

LESLEY'S TIP: The cookies will spread in the oven, so leave plenty space between each ball of cookie dough.

• Remove the cookies from the oven, place the tray on a wire cooling rack and allow to cool for 10 minutes and set a little. After 10 minutes gently place the cookies directly onto the wire rack to completely set and cool.
• Once cool store in an airtight container on the counter top.

LESLEY'S TIP: If you want your cookies to look a uniform size, or if some have really spread in the oven, I have a simple trick to fixing this. As soon as the cookies come out of the oven they will still be soft and pliable. Get a circular cookie cutter and place smooth side down over the cookie, taking care not to touch the sides of the cookie. Now working in a circular motion, move the cutter and gently reshape the cookies.

Recipe variations

• Chocolate Chips - use whatever flavour of chocolate you enjoy: milk; dark; white; chocolate orange. Or mix up your flavours, so long as you end up with 140g (5oz) of chocolate chips.
• Nuts - I love adding nuts to cookies for added crunch. You can swap pistachios for chopped almonds, hazelnuts, pecans, brazil or macadamia nuts.
• Dried Fruits - raisin, sultanas, currants, cranberry, blueberry, all work with a basic cookie.
• Citrus Burst - ramp up the fruity flavour by adding some citrus zest. When it comes to flavouring lemon, lime, or orange zest can transform a simple cookie.

Useful hints and tips

1. Shelled pistachios nuts are expensive! So I prefer to use a bag of shell on pistachios and shell them myself. A 200g (7oz) bag of shell on pistachios will give you roughly 100g (3.5oz) of shelled pistachios once the shells have been removed.
2. Line the baking tray with a silicone baking sheet or baking parchment as this will stop the cookies sticking to the tray.
3. Cookie dough freezes really well so make a double batch, freezing some of the dough to make cookies another day.
4. For anyone with a nut allergy, simply leave out the pistachios and increase the chocolate chips to 200g (7oz) if you wish.
5. Allergy advice: for comprehensive and detailed allergy advice go to Allergy UK.

FAQs

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Additional recipe suggestions

If you like this recipe then try some of my other easy cookie recipes:

• Lemon Pistachio Cookies
• Easy Date Oat Cookies with Ginger
• Chocolate & Hazelnut Cookies
• Orange Butter Biscuits
• Lemon Butter Biscuits
• Ginger & Chilli Biscuits

If you enjoyed this bake have a look at my Fun Baking with Kids post, full of great recipe suggestions for baking with children.