… Wants Homemade Chocolate Chip Cookies

My significant other & our daughter wanted me to make them some cookies. So, I took out my Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book (one of my favorite go-to cookbooks for recipes) and my daughter & I tried our hands at making Chocolate Chip Cookies.

Not too bad for a first try, eh? My daughter couldn’t resist nibbling away on these chocolatey munchies even after a full dinner.

Yeah, I know that the cookies are not so healthy, but we hardly ever eat cookies. So having them once in a while is okay. Here’s the recipe we’d used:

Chocolate Chip Cookies
From Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book 14th Edition, page 244

Prep: 40 minutes
Bake: 8 minutes per batch
Oven: 375 degrees Fahrenheit
Makes: 60 cookies

– 3/4 cup butter, softened (173g, I’d used unsalted butter that I’d cut into small pieces to hasten the softening … see the picture below)
– 1/4 cup shortening (didn’t have any, so added additional 58g unsalted butter)
– 1 cup packed brown sugar
– 1/2 cup granulated sugar
– 3/4 teaspoon baking soda (didn’t have any, so had used 1 teaspoon baking powder instead)
– 1/2 teaspoon salt
– 2 eggs
– 1 teaspoon vanilla
– 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
– 1 12-ounce package (2 cups) semisweet chocolate pieces (I’d used Hershey’s Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips)
– 1 1/2 cups chopped walnuts or pecans (optional) (really wanted to add walnuts but I was overruled by my daughter 🙂 )

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. In a large mixing bowl beat butter and shortening with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add brown sugar, granulated sugar, baking soda and salt. Beat until mixture is combined, scraping sides of bowl. Beat in eggs and vanilla until combined. Beat in as much of the flour as you can with the mixer. Stir in remaining flour. Stir in chocolate pieces and, if desired, nuts.

2. Drop dough by rounded teaspoons 2 inches apart onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 8 to 9 minutes or until edges are light brown. Transfer to a wire rack; cool.

The Better Homes and Gardens website has a slightly different online version of this recipe here.

Here’s a picture of the hard butter fresh from the freezer, that I’d cut into small pieces to get it to quickly soften in a few minutes.