Sullivan Street Bakery: Colpa Degno
Jim Lahey learned about great bread from his travels to Rome, Italy. He mastered the art, wrote a couple books and now supplies bread to over 300 restaurants in NYC. The food you’ll find at Sullivan Street Bakery and the recipes in his books are easy and delicious.
Sullivan Street Bakery’s Colpa Degno cookies were named as such because the term translates to “worth the guilt.” Colpa Degno’s are very easy to make and the end result is a light, chewy and chocolatey cookie. You can find this recipe and many more in Jim’s famous book The Sullivan Street Bakery Cookbook by Jim Lahey with Maya Joseph.
Another creation with just a few simple ingredients, the Colpa Degno’s can be whipped up very quickly and the texture and flavor are fantastic. We cruised through the entire baking process without any goofy mess-ups and are proud to report we loved the end product.
Recipe
Ingredients
185 grams (1 2/3 cups) confectioners’ sugar
40 grams (scant 1/2 cup) unsweetened dark cocoa powder
2.5 grams (1/2 teaspoon) coarse sea salt
Whites from 2 large eggs
6 grams (1 1/4 teaspoons) vanilla extract
100 grams (1/2 cup) milk chocolate chips
100 grams (1/2 cup) dark chocolate chips
Directions
1. Heat the oven to 375 degrees F. and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Whisk the powdered sugar, cocoa powder, and salt with a fork in a medium bowl to combine. Whisk together the egg whites and the vanilla with the fork in a small bowl. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the egg white; stir the mixture with the fork until it just begins to come together. Add the chocolates and stir until well combined. The dough will be extremely sticky and as dark as licorice.
2. At the bakery, we use a #60 scoop (like a small ice cream scoop) to scoop and ball these, but and ordinary 1 tablespoon measuring spoon works well too. Pack the batter into the spoon by squashing and dragging the spoon against the inside of the bowl to make sure the rounds of dough are tight and compact. If the dough is too loosely packed, the cookies tend to really spread out and separate as they bake. Place the rounds of the dough on the parchment-lined cookie sheet a good 3 inches apart and bake for about 12 minutes or until the tops are glossy and set. When the cookies are done, they will be quite gooey, but they will continue to cook as they cool. Once they’ve cooled off enough to eat, they should be soft and chewy — if they are hard or crisp, they’ve baked too much. Cool the cookies on the paper, set on a wire rack, for 10 minutes. Repeat with the remaining dough. Serve these cookies the day they are made.
