White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies

For the past two years, I've worked weekends at my town's local cab company.  It's a job that I've done to make some extra bills so I can pay off MY extra bills and have generally enjoyed it enough to stay there longer than I have ever stayed at a part-time job.

That's not to say my part-time job is perfect.  In fact, since I'm in the communication business at the cab company (I basically take phone calls, put cab requests in the computer and panic if the dispatcher steps away from their microphone for a smoke break.), the worst moments are when we have miscommunication.

These cookies were an apology gift to Pablo, who was driving the airport shuttle bus on Sunday.  He called me to see if there was a credit card number in the office on one of his fares, I thought he was checking to see if he could accept credit cards and long story short, Pablo got screwed out of $11.50.  Since Pablo is an all-around nice guy, I promised him that I would bake some cookies as a mea culpa and even let him pick what kind of cookie he wanted.  So he picked these.

That was a wise choice ... they are damn tasty.

White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies
adapted from Brown Eyed Baker who adapted them from Crepes of Wrath

Yield: About 2 dozen cookies (depending on size)

2 cups all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
¾ cup butter, melted
1 cup packed light brown sugar
½ cup white sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 cup chopped macadamia nuts
8 oz. white chocolate (Brown Eyed Baker used 2 c. of white chocolate chips. I used 2 Ghiardelli White Chocolate bars and chopped them roughly with my knife.)

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Grease baking sheets or line with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.

2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt and set aside.

3. Beat together the melted butter, brown sugar, and white sugar. Beat in the egg, then beat in the egg yolk, then beat in the vanilla.

4. Gradually add the flour mixture to the sugar mixture until just moistened. Stir in the macadamia nuts and white chocolate chips by hand with a rubber spatula.

5. Roll into balls or drop by heaping tablespoons onto baking sheets.

6. Bake for 12-15 minutes or until the edges look golden brown and the middles don’t look quite set. Allow to finish cooling on the baking sheet.