First time poster. I figured I would start with something that's been bugging me for a while.
I understand the difference between baking soda (alkaline, needs acid to combine and produce CO2) and baking powder (balanced acid/base, produces CO2 when dissolved and heated).
Now take a standard chocolate-chip cookie recipe, like Nestle's Tollhouse:
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 large eggs
- 2 cups (12-oz. pkg.) Semi-Sweet Chocolate Morsels
- 1 cup chopped walnuts
- Plus leavening agent (baking soda and/or baking powder)
I would expect basic chocolate-chip cookies to use baking powder, since for what I can tell, most of the ingredients are pretty neutral (not the chocolate, but it's in chips, so it probably doesn't count).
So why is it that most chocolate-chip cookies call for baking _soda_??? TollHouse, Mrs. Field's, Alton Brown's, etc, etc. Clearly it seems to work, just trying to understand why :-)
Thanks!