Chocolate Chip Cookies Made With Lard

Last Updated on March 15, 2024 by Michelle

Yes, lard is amazing for baking. And yes, it’s a good fat to have in your family’s diet and use in your kitchen daily. Read more about baking with lard (& why you should) here.

But this recipe is also delicious is all you have is butter on hand. Since butter behaves a little differently in baking than lard does, you will want to do things a little differently with this recipe, so be sure to see the note below for more details about that.

Mint Chocolate Chunk Cookies Made with Lard

INGREDIENTS

1 cup lard (or butter), at room temperature

1 1⁄2 cups light brown sugar
1⁄2 cup white sugar
2 eggs, at room temperature
1 1⁄2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1⁄4 cup maple syrup
3-3 1⁄4 cups all-purpose flour
1⁄8 cup dried mint leaves
2 teaspoon cornstarch
1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt (I use this one)
2 cups chocolate chips
1⁄4 cup chocolate chunks

 

DIRECTIONS

  1. In a large bowl, beat lard and sugars. Mix in eggs, vanilla, and maple syrup.
  2. Combine 3 cups flour, mint, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a separate bowl, then beat the flour mixture into the lard (or butter) mixture.
  3. Stir in chips and chocolate chunks.
  4. Preheat oven to 325°F.
  5. Place teaspoonfuls of dough on cookie sheets. No need to space out much, these cookies don’t spread when they bake. But you will need to flatten them with a floured cup bottom or a fork if you prefer them to be flatter instead of thick and round. The lard will hold it’s shape in a thicker mound if you don’t flatten them. (Both ways makes for a delicious cookie, so don’t stress over this.)
  6. Bake for 11-12 minutes, switching trays from top to bottom racks halfway through. (The cookies may appear a bit underdone, but their edges should just begin to turn golden brown.)

NOTES

  • I render my lard and freeze it in butter-shaped molds so it’s super easy to use in place on butter in any recipe. Go here for more details about baking with lard.
  • If you’re using butter instead of lard, you will need to chill the dough for at least 30 minutes before working with it. Add an additional 1⁄4 cup of flour if the dough doesn’t seem quite thick enough after refrigeration. (Before chilling, if I’m using butter in this recipe, my dough is always too gooey, but I resist the urge to keep adding flour because I have made these cookies too cake-like by doing that in the past.)
  • If you’re using butter you may find you want to cook the cookies a few minutes longer and cool them completely on cookie sheets, where they’ll flatten, and their centers will harden slightly while on the tray. After they’ve cooled, they’re chewy and moist.
  • For the mint, I use chocolate mint that I grow in our garden every summer. But any variety of mint is delicious in this recipe. Since I store my mint in the dried leaf form all winter long, I need to measure out about 1⁄4 cup of dried leaves and crush them in a mini food processor. This leaves me with about 1⁄8 cup of mint.
  • While mint is optional in this recipe, I find I need the little extra “umpf.” I will admit lard does not pack the same taste punch as butter (I LOVE butter yall) but the little bit of mint makes a huge difference in the taste category. Most folks say they don’t even taste the mint in the cookies. (So feel free to add more.)
  • Chocolate chunks are also optional, of course, well I mean to most folks. I don’t see them as optional, cause I love the extra, bigger burst of chocolate in every cookie.
  • While any salt will work just fine in this recipe, Redmonds salt is truly the best. It’s mined over 400 feet below ground, right here in the U.S. so it’s naturally protected from pollutants (not something you can say about salt mined from the ocean) and more than 60 trace minerals. If you want to try it out, use my code SWEETSALT to save 15% off your entire order, anytime.

YIELDS ABOUT 4 DOZEN COOKIES

Can you buy lard for making chocolate chip cookies?

You can absolutely source good lard, either as fat that you can render down yourself, or as already rendered lard. Here are some tips:

  1. If you live in New England and would like to purchase a whole or half a pig, I would love to chat about how our family farm can help you load your freezer next fall (with amazing pig fat as well as delicious pasture-raised meat). We keep a waiting list, and I am always happy to meet new customers and expand our plans for next year, to make sure your family enjoys high-quality meat next year if I can’t help you today. To message me, hop over to instagram or send an email to michelle(dot)visser(at)outlook(dot)com.
  2. Find local pig farmers and ask around until you can hopefully find one who either sells lard they have rendered or maybe the raw fat which you can then render yourself. (Or just store away until you use it, in the case of caul fat.)
  3. Go to eatwild.com and search for a pig farm near you.
  4. Order online. Seriously. You can purchase this amazing fat, ready to use, and shipped to your door:

Caul fat

Lard made from back fat

Lard made from the inner, leaf fat 

 

Items I Use in This Recipe:

Talk to me!

If you have any questions, leave a comment below. And please tag me on ig to show me your amazing Mint Chocolate Chip cookies @souly.rested.

 

More Information on This Topic:

How to Bake with Lard (& why you should)

3 Types of Pork Lard — everything you need to know about each one.

How to Render Lard–a complete guide

Tools I Wouldn’t Want to be Without in my Farmhouse Kitchen

 


“He satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.” Psalm 107:9


 

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