I recently made this recipe after printing it out from the Neiman Marcus website, and it says to bake the cookies in a 300 degree oven for about 20 minutes (not at 375 degrees for 8 to 10 minutes). These cookies stayed very moist and chewy much longer than any other chocolate chip cookies I've made, and I think the reason is that they were baked at a lower temperature.
Good, but this is not the real recipe for the Neiman Marcus cookies. You may actually find it in this site under "Urban Legend Chocolate Chip Cookies", there's a cookie to die for!
I'm sure it's a good cookie recipe, but it's NOT the $250 recipe of urban legend. I received a copy of that more than 15 years ago, and it involved many other ingredients, including grated chocolate and, I believe, oatmeal. I'm still looking for a copy of the "scam" recipe that really did make an amazing cookie!
The $250 story is TRUE! My aunt was the one who was charged for it. However, the true cookie recipe is a bit different. She bought two salads, a scarf, and asked to buy the recipe. The waitress said she could if she paid "two fifty". My aunt assumed it meant $2.50. She called the account office at Neiman Marcus after receiving the bill and they refused to refund her. So, she told them that she was going to have $250 dollars worth of fun with the recipe. She printed it in our family's cookbook, and gave the recipe out to everyone she could think of and told them to give it out to others. So, there you have it. I assure you that the story is true, but like I said...the real recipe is slightly different.
I also printed the "Original" recipe from the Neiman Marcus website when they had it there briefly and this one IS it! It's a delicious wonderful cookie. It's on the cakie side rather than raw flat side. Mine came out fat but great!
Like another reviewer, I followed the 300 degree oven - after comparing this recipe with the NM website. Gorgeous cookies - not too thick or too thin. Photogenic!
Generally I prefer a chocolate chip cookie with equal measures of brown sugar and granulated sugar; and I particularly don't care for cookies with more brown sugar than white. While they do impart more of a butterscotchy flavor (especially if you use dark brown sugar), they also make the cookie softer, a characteristic more beloved by Hubs than myself. I guess you could say that's exactly why I tried this recipe - to please Hubs... and curiosity too, I admit. What a surprise! And what a way to wake up your taste buds! Outside of there being too many chocolate chips for my chocolate taste buds anyway, these are quite possibly one of the better chocolate chip cookies I've ever made and, having baked for decades, I've tried many. First, they are an inviting delight to the eye, just a beautiful cookie. Not flat (hate that) and not little balls (hate that too). Just a nice, thicki-ish, hearty looking cookie. Reach for one and after one bite you're sold. One hundred percent sold. You get everything here that's most desired in a chocolate chip cookie - they're crispy, chewy and soft and gooey all at the same time. They're rich and buttery, and the espresso makes them taste even more chocolaty. Feel confident to bake these at 375 degrees as directed. Absolutely no reason to do otherwise. As for the authenticity of their being the genuine Neiman Marcus cookie? I don't know. And I couldn't care less. (Update: Hubs said he'd have preferred these without the espresso)
These are the best cookies ever. If you bake them at the 8 minutes they are chewy. They have a great balance of flavor.
As a Neiman Marcus employee I can vouch that although this is not the recipe you get in the "Neiman Marcus 250 Cookie Recipe" spam email this one is the real deal. These cookies are really good if you like the "super sweet & not homemade" tasting cookies you buy from the grocery store. They aren't my favorite but I still eat them whenever we have them at work.
