Browned Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies

"I made a serendipitous discovery the other day, a discovery that countless bakers have made throughout time eternal. On a quest to make chocolate chip cookies it was discovered by my young charges that no chocolate chips remained in the cupboard. Instead, we found a bag of Hershey bars. So, we chopped them up into large chip-sized pieces and used them instead. You know what happens when you use chunks of chocolate bars instead of chocolate chips in cookies? First, they’re bigger, so you get these pockets of chocolate explosions when you eat the cookies. Second, the edges melt into the cookie dough, permeating more of the cookie with chocolatey-ness. Chocolate chips are formulated to hold their shape while baking (less cocoa butter); chocolate bars are made to melt the moment they enter your mouth. We used milk chocolate bars for this recipe because that’s what we had. While milk chocolate was a favorite when I was a kid, it is less so now. I usually prefer the darkest chocolate available. However, in this recipe, the milk chocolate chunks work great.They give a warm creaminess to the cookie that wouldn’t be there if you used semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate. That said, use whatever chocolate you like. We also brown the butter in the first step of the recipe. Browned butter adds a wonderful nutty aroma to the dough. It’s an added step, but one well worth doing. From the recipe archive. First posted 2013...."