Even if they aren’t directly connected to Alexander, the hardest nut to crack in the world shares key qualities with the conqueror (to extract the edible Macadamia nut from its shell requires 300 pounds of pressure per square inch). Most notable, both the King of Macedonia and the pride of the Proteaceae family of flowering plants, share an imperialistic nature.
You see, when you mix Macademia nuts with chocolate chips in a one-to-one ratio, those chips are overpowered by the nuts like the Persians were overpowered by the Macedonians at the Battle of Issus.
Leaving 330 BC and bringing things into a more modern context, allow me to express my point Pedro Martinez style: Macadamia nuts are the chocolate chips daddy.
To balance their strong, buttery, vibrant, almost coconutty taste, I declare: add way more chocolate chips than nuts! What is the proper ration? I don’t know. Perhaps 3:1?
I’m better at eating cookies than calculating things about cookies.
The other alternative is to use this native-to-Australia-but-mostly-now-grown-industrially-in-Hawaii-and sometimes-South Africa-nut, and chop it up into smaller pieces. Not only will that dilute the taste a bit, but it will also have the added benefit of aesthetics. A split macadamia nut adds a vivacious pearly white sheen to the cookie, a whole macadamia nut kind of makes it look like you spilled chickpeas into the batter.
Splitting the nut is also good for your pocket (and we love that). Taking 7-10 years to bear fruit, and being located in tropical climates, you can’t get Macadamia nuts for peanuts. You need that fiat-money baby! That is, unless your local macadamia nut dealer accepts crypto.