"OHH, you didn't have to, really you didn't have to; I'm used to just bringing my own meal." 

I was tired of hearing this from my friends with food allergies or preferences say this every week when they'd come over for dinner. They'd sit with their sad takeout from the grocery store while we'd feast on homemade meals and tasty desserts every Tuesday for our community group gatherings.

And I was tired of feeling bad about it. What kind of hostess would I be if I expected my friend, who I invited to dinner at my house, to sit this one out because I decided I wanted to serve a glutenous treat?

Before, as one of my favorite YouTubers calls it, The Great Unpleasantness, I would cook and bake for various social occasions each week. A community group gathering on Tuesday with friends who are gluten-free and avoid dairy, and a girl’s night on Wednesdays that needs baked goods without eggs and milk. To be honest, I started to get bored with the few allergy-friendly cookbooks in my possession. I wanted to bake the brownies from the most recent Ina Garten episode I just watched, or Gesina Prado's focaccia bread that would be perfect alongside the soup I was planning for my Tuesday night gathering.

That's when the idea for BAKEOVERS was born. Slowly but surely, I started taking 'traditional' recipes and swapping in egg replacements or gluten-free flour. I didn't tell anyone at first because I wanted to see if they could tell the difference. To my friends with food allergies, I’d just say “This is {insert their name here} friendly”, to which they’d smile and dig right in.

Bakeovers are my version of a recipe makeover, given the Everybody Baking Co. treatment. I'll share and link you up with the original recipe that inspired my variations, and then share the gluten-free, dairy-free, and vegan versions here. I thought these cookies would be the perfect place to start - pan banging chocolate chip cookies.

Intriguing title? Check.

Drool-worthy golden crispy brown allure? Check.

I've read about these cookies for a while now, and even Ina Garten has her version in her newest cookbook. Sarah Keiffer is a Minneapolis-based home baker and 2x cookbook author. Her Vanilla Bean Blog is the home of our Bakeover Candidate today.

Some things to know

1. Sugar is the star. These cookies are deliciously golden in color and crispy on the edges with gooey just cooked centers. The crisp forms as they cool thanks to the high amount of sugar, mainly white sugar. As the sugar bakes, it carmelizes, making the cookies browner and crisper by absorbing moisture in the dough. As the white sugar melts, this is also why the cookies spread. This also is key to the pan banging that will ensue: dropping the pan will push the melted dough outward from the center, resulting in ripply goodness with each bang of the sheet pan.

2. Use high-quality bar chocolate. Pools of delicious bittersweet chocolate top the cookie by chopping a bar of chocolate instead of using chips. Sarah has a great section of baking notes on the recipe posting, and she explains chocolate chips do not spread as well as chopped chocolate. Also important to note that using bittersweet or semisweet chocolate ensures the cookies remain dairy-free. This is because these types of chocolate contain cocoa butter, which despite the name, is a butter derived from the cocoa bean and has nothing to do with dairy. I found this great resource on brands and types of chocolate that are dairy-free and outlines which brands are gluten, nut, or soy-free.

3. Freezing the dough.After you scoop out the dough, you’ll place it in the freezer for 15 minutes. This ensures that the centers have a chance to stay gooey instead of completely baking flat in the pan.

4. Notes on a successful egg, dairy, or gluten-free variation.Dairy: the main dairy concern here is butter (see note about chocolate above). This is super easy when we use any vegan butter of choice. I really have grown to like Miyoko's European style butter, but my old standby has always been Earth Balance Vegan Unsalted Butter. In the pictures below, I used Earth Balance.

5. Eggs: an egg’s role in cookie dough is to give lift and moisture to bring dry ingredients together. This recipe only calls for one egg. I use my favorite egg replacement: 1.5 tbsp water + 1.5 tbsp oil (I like coconut oil but have used vegetable…whatever you have!) + 1 tsp baking powder combined together and added as you would an egg. You’ll notice when you add the baking powder there is some fun fizzing going on - giving us, ta-da! - air bubbles which will give us lift!

6. Flour: I think this is the biggest gamble in swapping in and out sometimes. Flour’s role in baking is to bind ingredients together with the strength of gluten strands created during the mixing process. This recipe doesn’t call for a lot of flour, to begin with, because we want the dough to have the freedom to spread out, not stick together in a ball. With gluten-free flours, we typically need to add additional components to ensure strength is achieved to hold everything together. The great part here is we don’t need much lifting power from the flour because these cookies are naturally flat. I have learned a lot from this series of infographics to understand what ratios of ingredients are needed to ensure the result you need from a gluten-free blend. This is why I typically prefer to blend my own flour for gluten-free baking; it gives you a finer edge of control.

7. The cookies I photographed for this recipe are gluten-free, dairy-free, and egg-free. BELIEVE YOUR EYES, FRIENDS. When I am testing a recipe, I start with the most complex version to see what happens. Using gluten-free flour does produce a slightly flatter cookie than those with all-purpose flour, but we get that same crunchy cookie we’re going for. Remember, gluten-free baked goods sometimes don’t brown as well, need longer to cook, and absolutely need longer to cool. So, patience is required if you’re attempting gluten-free!

And with that, here is our maiden voyage of the Bakeover series! What questions do you have?

Use the comments, and I’ll get you an answer in a jiffy! Your questions will make these recipes better going forward, I promise!

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EBCo. Chocolate Chip Ripple Cookies

Inspired by Sarah Kieffer’s Vanilla Bean Blog: Pan Banging Chocolate Chip Cookies

jump to your ingredients of choice:

TRADITIONAL | GLUTEN-FREE | VEGAN | GLUTEN & DAIRY FREE

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💯gluten & dairy free

GF Flour Blend:

• 84g White Rice Flour

• 84g Brown Rice Flour

• 42g Potato Starch

• 42g Tapioca Starch

• 14g Potato Flour

• 8g Xanthan Gum

• 8g Pectin

12g baking soda (1 tsp)

5g kosher salt (1 tsp)

225g unsalted vegan butter, at room temperature (2 sticks) 

300g granulated sugar

50g light brown sugar

Equivalent of 1 egg:

• mix 1.5 tbsp water + 1.5 tbsp oil + 1 tsp baking powderer

2 tablespoons water

170g bittersweet chocolate (I prefer Guittard, chopping into bite-sized pieces ranging +/- ½ inch (6 oz)

🥐traditional

284g All Purpose Flour (2 cups)

½ teaspoon baking soda

¾ teaspoon salt

227 g unsalted butter, room temperature (½ pound or 2 sticks)

300 g granulated sugar (1½ cups)

50 g packed brown sugar (¼ cup)

1 large egg

1½ teaspoons Pure Vanilla Extract

2 tablespoons water

170g bittersweet chocolate (I prefer Guittard, chopping into bite-sized pieces ranging +/- ½ inch (6 oz)

🌈gluten free

GF Flour Blend:

• 84g White Rice Flour

• 84g Brown Rice Flour

• 42g Potato Starch

• 42g Tapioca Starch

• 14g Potato Flour

• 8g Xanthan Gum

• 8g Pectin

12g baking soda (1 tsp)

5g kosher salt (1 tsp)

225g unsalted butter, at room temperature (2 sticks) 

300g granulated sugar

50g light brown sugar

1 egg

2 tablespoons water

170g bittersweet chocolate (I prefer Guittard, chopping into bite-sized pieces ranging +/- ½ inch (6 oz)

✨vegan

284g All Purpose Flour (2 cups)

½ teaspoon baking soda

¾ teaspoon salt

227 g unsalted vegan butter, room temperature (½ pound or 2 sticks)

300 g granulated sugar (1½ cups)

50 g packed brown sugar (¼ cup)

Equivalent of 1 egg:

• mix 1.5 tbsp water + 1.5 tbsp oil + 1 tsp baking powder

1½ teaspoons Pure Vanilla Extract

2 tablespoons water

170g bittersweet chocolate (I prefer Guittard, chopping into bite-sized pieces ranging +/- ½ inch (6 oz)

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Materials

Stand mixer

Kitchen scale

Small and medium bowls

Cutting Board

Knife

Spatula

2 3/4 oz cookie scoop or 1/3 cup measure

Foil

Sheet pan

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Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350F, and place the rack in the middle of the oven.

2. Line your baking sheet with aluminum foil, making sure to keep the dull side facing up.

3. In a small bowl, weigh your dry ingredients of flour(s), baking soda, and salt - set aside.

4. In your stand mixer bowl, beat butter on medium speed until creamy using the paddle attachment. Then add your white and brown sugar, and continue to beat on medium until light and fluffy - about 2-3 minutes.

5. Scrape down the sides of your bowl and your paddle, then add your egg (or egg replacement), vanilla, and water. Turn mixer on low to combine.

6. Scrape your bowl down again, then add your dry ingredients - mix on low until combined.

7. Add your chopped chocolate, and mix on low to incorporate.

8. Either scoop your dough (using your cookie scoop or 1/3 cup measure) - or, my favorite, weigh out 100g balls of dough. Place four balls on the prepared pan equal distance apart; they will spread, so give them room.

9. Place the sheet pan in the freezer for 15 minutes. Scoop or weigh out the remaining dough onto a pan to place in the freezer while the others are baking.

10. Place the baking sheet with the four cookies in the oven and bake for 10 minutes; the center of the cookies will be puffed slightly in the center.

11. Open the oven, and lift the side of the baking sheet about 4 inches, and gently drop it onto the baking rack. Sarah Kieffer says this will feel so wrong - but trust this genius!

12. Repeat the pan banging again in 2 minutes, the centers will be slightly puffed again. Repeat a few more times until the cookies have baked for 16-18 minutes. They will be soft, spread out, and golden brown - the centers will be lighter and not fully cooked.

13. Transfer the baking sheet to a wire rack; let cool completely before removing the cookies from the pan.

14. *NOTE: with gluten-free flour-based cookies, please transfer the whole piece of foil with the cookies from the pan to the wire rack to not disturb the structural integrity as they cool; they are a little bit more delicate than those made with all-purpose flour.

I sat on the cream linoleum floor, curled up next to the cast iron wood stove to warm my frozen toes fresh from my sopping wet boots. I had just come in from an afternoon in the snow, exploring the woods at my grandma's house in northern Michigan. The afternoon of this memory isn't one snowy day in particular. It's an entire season filled with memories of American Girl books, Anne of Avonlea rentals, and this flavor memory I hold so dearly.

Buttered saltine crackers in my grandma's kitchen.

This spring, I enrolled in Christina Tosi's Monthly course on creative baking. I wanted to flex my culinary education muscles and get inspired by someone I admire while creating a collection of baking courses due out over the next year. The goal of the course is to learn Christina’s recipes and then be inspired to write your own. Honestly, the only recipe I’ve ever taken 100% credit for writing from scratch is the Martian Mallow sundae at Scoops, the ice cream shop I worked at in high school. Other than that, my recipes have been minor riffs on other recipes I've known and loved.

While this recipe starts with a riff on a recipe from the class, it digs deep into my own flavor story centered around this memory. Entire sleeves of Saltines, being devoured along with a sidecar of Fleishman's. My cookie goals were as follows. 

1. To mimic the crunchy familiar feeling of the crackers.

2. To fill the flour with the powdery saltiness that is signature to Saltines.

3. Nail the gooeyness of room temperature butter slathered on those perfect little bites.

This recipe, of course, is Everybody approved with variations from traditional to gluten and dairy free. Choose your ingredient list below and get baking!

Please note, I'm going to be writing recipes using grams instead of cups measurements for dry ingredients from now on. I highly recommend you purchase a kitchen scale. I've had this scale for over a decade, bought on a whim from the clearance section at Sur La Table - it has not disappointed!

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Buttered Saltine Crunch Cookie

jump to your ingredients of choice: TRADITIONAL | GLUTEN-FREE | VEGAN | GLUTEN & DAIRY FREE

🥐traditional

Ingredients for the Brown Butter Saltine Crunch

• 65 g Saltines

• 15 g non-fat milk powder (1/3 cup + 1 Tbsp) 

• 2 g kosher salt (3/4 tsp)

• 50 g browned butter

Ingredients for the Buttered Saltine Crunch Cookie

• 225 g unsalted butter, at room temperature (2 sticks) 

• 300 g granulated sugar

• 100 g light brown sugar

• 1 egg

• 130g All-purpose flour

• 130g ground saltine crackers

• 3 g baking soda (1/4 tsp)

• 5 g kosher salt (1 1/2 tsp)

• 65 g mini marshmallows

• 60g panko bread crumbs (about a ½ cup)

🌈gluten free

Ingredients for the Brown Butter Saltine Crunch

• 65 g Schär Gluten-Free Table Crackers

• 15 g non-fat milk powder (1/3 cup + 1 Tbsp) 

• 2 g kosher salt (3/4 tsp)

• 50 g browned butter

Ingredients for the Buttered Saltine Crunch Cookie

• 225 g unsalted butter, at room temperature (2 sticks) 

• 300 g granulated sugar

• 100 g light brown sugar

• 1 egg

GF Flour Blend:

• 40g White Rice Flour

• 24g Cornstarch

• 22g Brown Rice Flour

• 20g Tapioca Starch

• 18g Non-Fat Dry Milk

• 4g Potato Starch

• 3g Xanthan Gum

130g ground Schär Gluten-Free Table Crackers

3 g baking soda (1/4 tsp)

5 g kosher salt (1 1/2 tsp)

65 g mini marshmallows

60g gluten-free panko bread crumbs (like Kikkoman brand)

✨vegan

Ingredients for the Brown Butter Saltine Crunch

• 65 g Saltines

• 15 g soy milk or coconut milk powder (1/3 cup + 1 Tbsp) 

• 2 g kosher salt (3/4 tsp)

• 50 g browned butter (Use Miyoko's European-style vegan butter - it's the only one that will brown due to nut-based proteins)

Ingredients for the Buttered Saltine Crunch Cookie

• 225 g unsalted vegan butter, at room temperature (2 sticks) 

• 300 g granulated sugar

• 100 g light brown sugar

Equivalent of 1 egg

• Mix 1.5 tablespoons water + 1.5 tablespoons coconut oil + 1 tsp baking powder

130g All-purpose flour

130g ground saltine crackers

3 g baking soda (1/4 tsp)

5 g kosher salt (1 1/2 tsp)

65 g mini marshmallows

60g panko bread crumbs (about a ½ cup)

💯gluten & dairy free

Ingredients for the Brown Butter Saltine Crunch

65 g Schär Gluten-Free Table Crackers

15 g soy milk or coconut milk powder (1/3 cup + 1 Tbsp) 

2 g kosher salt (3/4 tsp)

50 g browned vegan butter (Use Miyoko's European-style vegan butter - it's the only one that will brown due to nut-based proteins)

Ingredients for the Buttered Saltine Crunch Cookie

225 g unsalted vegan butter, at room temperature (2 sticks) 

300 g granulated sugar

100 g light brown sugar

Equivalent of 1 egg

• Mix 1.5 tablespoons water + 1.5 tablespoons coconut oil + 1 tsp baking powder

GF Flour Blend:

• 40g White Rice Flour

• 24g Cornstarch

• 22g Brown Rice Flour

• 20g Tapioca Starch

• 18g Non-Fat Dry Milk

• 4g Potato Starch

• 3g Xanthan Gum

130g ground Schär Gluten-Free Table Crackers

3 g baking soda (1/4 tsp)

5 g kosher salt (1 1/2 tsp)

65 g mini marshmallows

60g gluten-free panko bread crumbs (like Kikkoman brand)

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Materials

Stand mixer

Kitchen scale

Small and medium bowls and containers

Spatula

2 3/4 oz cookie scoop or 1/3 cup measure

Parchment paper

Sheet pan

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Instructions

Make the Brown Butter Saltine Crunch

1. Preheat your oven to 275° F

2. To brown your butter, melt in a saucepan over medium-low heat until the butter becomes nutty golden brown. (For a tutorial, Sallys Baking Addiction has a great one). Set aside until you're ready to use.

3. Place the crackers in a bowl and crush them with your hands until they are in half-inch or smaller pieces.

4. Add the milk powder and salt and toss to mix.

5. Pour butter over crackers and toss to coat, then spread the mixture evenly on a sheet pan lined with parchment.

6. Bake for 20 minutes and cool before incorporating it into your cookie dough. Pieces should be golden brown and have a soft crunch when cooled.

Make your cookie dough.

1. Preheat the oven to 375° F.

2. Weigh out your saltine crackers and place them into a food processor fitted with a steel blade. Process until crackers are fine and powdery.

3. Add the butter and sugar to your mixer bowl. Cream together at medium to high speed for 3 minutes using the paddle attachment.

4. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and the paddle, add the egg, and beat on high for 7-8 minutes.

5. Measure your flour, pulverized cracker crumbs, baking soda, and salt together and sift them together with a fork to distribute everything together.

6. With the mixer on low, add dry ingredients. Mix for about 1 minute and then scrape down the sides of the bowl to make sure every bit of the butter-sugar mix is incorporated with the flour mix until there is no dry flour bits in the bowl.

7. Add your Brown Butter Cracker Bits and mini marshmallows on low speed for about one minute until evenly distributed.

8. Using a 2 3⁄4 oz ice cream scoop (or you can measure each cookie on your scale to be 2.75 oz), scoop one portion of your dough, and roll in a bowl of panko bread crumbs. Place on a sheet pan lined with parchment and push down on the top slightly so the cookie dough balls look like small hockey pucks. These cookies do spread when baked, so be sure to leave about 2 inches between each cookie on the sheet.

9. Refrigerate for 10 minutes, then bake for 12 minutes or until the top starts to be golden brown. Take the cookies out of the oven but do not remove a cookie from the pan for 10-15 minutes. These cookies are super soft, but hard as they cool. If you try to remove them from the pan too soon, they'll fall apart. However, this is key to the ooey-gooey factor, so it's totally worth it.

buttered-saltine-crunch-cookie-3.jpg

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