Cream together butter, brown sugar and barley malt syrup with a stand mixer using the paddle attachment or by hand using a wooden spoon. Once the mixture is thoroughly combined and fluffy, crack in the egg and continue beating until uniform, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.

Add the barley flour, whole wheat flour, baking soda, and cinnamon (if using). Mix until a uniform dough forms and no dry bits remain. Fold in the chocolate chips to the dough.

Refrigerate the dough for 30 minutes. (This step is optional but will make the dough slightly easier to handle).

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Line a baking tray with parchment paper or a silicon baking mat. Divide the refrigerated dough into 10 equal portions, rolling each into a ball. Space out the cookie dough balls on the baking tray so that there are at least 2.5 inches between each ball.

Before baking, flatten each cookie dough ball slightly by pressing down with the palm of your hand. Aim for a dough disk between ½ inch to ¾ inch thick. After refrigeration, these cookies will not spread very much during baking, so this step ensures that they do not turn out overly thick in the center.

Top each cookie dough with a smattering of flakey salt.

Bake in preheated oven for 11-14 minutes. 11 minutes will give you soft cookies while 14 minutes will give crunchy cookies. However, each oven is different, so I advise checking up on the cookies around 9 or 10 minutes. If you are making soft cookies, make sure that the tops of the cookies are dry before removing from the oven.

Let cool for at least 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool further. The cookies will be extremely soft when hot and will firm up as they cool.