sourdough chocolate chip cookies

sourdough chocolate chip cookies

• 13 Oct 2025

I follow Edd Kimber, the inaugural winner of the Great British Bake Off, on both Instagram and substack. Recently he posted a recipe for sourdough chocolate chip cookies, which he first made during lockdown as a way to use up his sourdough discard. The discard comes from the daily feeding of the starter.

I've been making sourdough bread on a regular basis since the end of lockdown and I've worked out a method of feeding my starter which results in almost no discard, so I had to make a batch of starter. I also halved the recipe and made the cookies with a single egg yolk as suggested by Edd. The dough was a little dry so I'd suggest using a whole egg instead.

The recipe also suggests 250g of chocolate. I don't know about you, but chocolate prices have risen+++ recently and a 125g block of ALDI premium dark chocolate that used to retail for $2.79, now retails for $4.00. I'm not going to spend $8.00 on premium chocolate for chocolate chip cookies, so I used a bit less chocolate in my cookies and I don't think they suffered at all.

Here's the recipe for you, in Edd's own words, which makes 12 cookies. If you'd like to make a larger batch, check the original recipe (linked above) which yields 25 cookies. For all my recipes I use a 250ml cup and a 20-ml tablespoon, unsalted butter and 60g eggs. My oven is a conventional gas oven so if your oven is fan forced you may need to reduce the oven temperature by 20°C.

Sourdough Chocolate Chip Cookies - makes 12 cookies
Ingredients
112g unsalted butter, diced
190g plain flour
½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ flaky sea salt
90g caster sugar
90g light brown sugar
1 egg
120g sourdough starter discard (100% hydration)
1 tsp vanilla extract
180g dark chocolate, roughly chopped

Method
Place the butter into a saucepan and over medium/high heat, cook until the butter melts, bubbles and then foams. Keep a close eye on it as it can burn quickly. When the milk solids have browned, the water will have evaporated so remove from the heat and set aside for 30 minutes or so, to cool slightly. Once browned, you should have 92g unsalted butter left. 

Whilst the butter is cooling, place the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt into a large bowl and whisk together to combine. When ready to make the cookies, place the cooled butter and sugars into a large bowl and using an electric mixer, fitted with the whisk attachment, whisk for a couple minutes to combine and to break up any lumps. Add the egg yolk and whisk for 2-3 minutes on medium/high. Don’t worry if it looks separated or greasy at the moment, it will come together once the starter has been added. 

Place the bowl on your scale and measure in the required sourdough discard, adding the vanilla as well. Mix in for a few minutes or until the mixture becomes smooth and fully combined. It should look a little like a thick cake batter. Add in the flour mixture and mix in on low speed, just until everything comes together and a dough has formed. Finally, switch to the paddle attachment and add the chocolate, mixing briefly until evenly distributed. 

Press a sheet of plastic wrap onto the surface of the cookie dough and refrigerate for at least 4 hours before baking (my preferred time frame to bake these is between 4-24 hours). 

When ready to bake, preheat the oven to 180⁰C, conventional, and line a couple baking trays with parchment paper. Roll the cookies into balls roughly 60g in size, placing 6 per baking tray, with plenty of space between each one as these will spread. Sprinkle the cookies with a little flaked sea salt. 

Bake in the preheated oven for about 16-18 minutes or until the cookies are lightly browned around the outside. If the cookies come out a little puffy looking, give the baking tray and firm tap on the counter to help them flatten a little. Allow to cool on the baking tray for 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely. 

Stored in a sealed container these will keep for 4-5 days. You can also freeze these balls of cookie dough for up to a month. Bake them straight from frozen with just a minute or two of extra bake time.

Is there anything better than a freshly baked still warm from the oven chocolate chip cookie? I don't think so?

See you all again next week, with some more baking from my kitchen.

Bye for now,

Jillian